8 ) to ) Work 11 ) 12 ) Read or look over accounts and Noon. to ) dine. 1 ) 2 ) Afternoon, to ) Work 5 ) 6 ) Put things in their place; Evening to ) supper; music or diversion or [Question, What good 9 ) conversation; examination of have I done to-day?] ) the day. 10 ) Night to ) Sleep. 4 ) It is evident that a scheme of life like this could not suit everyone. It is given as an illustration of the value of adhering to method in our work. "Order," the poet Pope says, "is Heaven's first law," and time well ordered means generally work well and thoroughly done. III. Punctuality.--This means keeping strictly as to time by any engagement we make either with ourselves or with others. If we resolve to do anything at a certain time, we should do it neither before nor after that time. It is better to be before than after. But it is best to be at the very minute. If we enter into an engagement with others for a certain time, we should be precise in keeping it. In a letter from a celebrated merchant, Buxton, to his son, he says, "Be punctual; I do not mean merely being in time for lectures, but mean that spirit out of which punctuality grows, that love of accuracy and precision which mark the efficient man. The habit of being punctual extends to everything--meeting friends, paying debts, going to church, reaching and leaving place of business, keeping promises, retiring at night and rising in the morning." We may lay down a system or method of work for ourselves, but it will be of little service unless we keep carefully to it, beginning and leaving off at the appointed moment. If the work of one hour is postponed to another, it will encroach on the time allotted to some other duty, if it do not remain altogether undone, and thus the whole business of the day is thrown into disorder. If a man loses half an hour by rising late in the morning, he is apt to spend the rest of the day seeking after it. Sir Walter Scott was not only methodical in his work, he was exceedingly punctual, always beginning his allotted task at the appointed moment. "When a regiment," he wrote, "is under march, the rear is often thrown into confusion because the front does not move steadily and without interruption. It is the same thing in business. If that which is first in hand be not instantly despatched, other things accumulate betimes, till affairs begin to press all at once, and no brain can stand the confusion." We should steadily cultivate the habit of punctuality. We can cultivate it until it becomes with us a second nature, and we do everything, as the saying