It would probably be very difficult, if not impossible, for any person to lay open his own case so completely to the view of others, that the rest of the world should be enabled to profit, as he himself, if he chooses, may do, by his past experience in these delicate matters. I shall hardly attempt such a task, however; but shall content myself with saying, that, on now looking back to those days, I can, in many instances, lay my hand upon the very hour, the very incident, and the very thought and feeling, which have given a decided direction to many very material actions of the intervening period. In some cases, the grievous anguish of remorse has engraved the lesson so deeply on the memory, that it shews like an open wound still. In others, it has left only a cicatrice, to mark where there has been suffering. But even these, like the analogous case of bodily injuries, are liable to give their twitches as the seasons vary. It is far pleasanter, however, and a still more profitable habit, I am quite sure, to store up agreeable images of the past, with a view to present and future improvement, as well as enjoyment, than to harass the thoughts too much by the contemplation of opportunities lost, or of faculties neglected or misused. Of this cheerful kind of retrospect, every person of right thoughts must have an abundant store. For, let the croakers say what they please, ‘this brave world’ is exceedingly fertile in sources of pleasure to those whose principles are sound, and who, at all times and seasons, are under the wholesome consciousness, that while, without higher aid, they can essentially do nothing, there will certainly be no such assistance lent them, unless they themselves, to use a nautical phrase, ‘bend their backs like seamen to the oar,’ and leave nothing untried to double the Cape of their own life and fortunes. It is in this vigorous and sustained exertion that most persons fail—this ‘attention suivie,’ as the French call it, which, as it implies the absence of self-distrust, gives, generally, the surest earnest of success.