NOTES. A. COMMONPLACE-BOOKS. "In reading authors, when you find To think on at another season, Be not contented with the sight, But take them down in black and white. Such a respect is wisely shown, As makes another's thoughts our own.' PRESIDENT DWIGHT's advice to students was, "Al“Always carry with you, wherever you go, a commonplacebook in your pockets, and note down on the spot what you wish to retain. That only is knowledge which is exact.'" Dr. Johnson remarks, that "a man who views an object closely and minutely and leaves it two or three hours or longer, and then returns, will be surprised to find how much the remembrance of the parts have faded from his mind. The great leading features may be retained, but the minute discriminating points are soon lost. You will, by having a commonplace-book always at hand, be able to get together a vast number of facts. You may think that it will be only once in a great while that you will meet with anything worth putting down; but you are mistaken-in almost every place, if you are observing, you will find much that will be important. It is from laziness (man is naturally lazy), rather than from want of capacity, that men are deficient in useful knowledge. Sagacity of mind depends almost wholly upon industry united with attention. Very few of our race attend to what is passing before them. This is a rare, very rare quality in the best disposed and most contemplative minds. A small note-book for the pocket, and Todd's 'Index Rerum,' or Gould's 'Universal Index,' for the commonplace-book, will facilitate this mode of storing up knowledge for future use. A commonplace-book, without methodical arrangement, would be just about as convenient as a large house without partition walls to separate it into apartments.' "While Sir Matthew Hale was improving himself in the study of the law," says Bishop Burnet," he not only kept the hours of the hall constantly in term-time, but seldom put himself out of commons in vacation-time; and continued, then, to follow his studies with unwearied diligence; and not being satisfied with the books writ about it, or to take things upon trust, was very diligent in searching all records. Then did he make divers collections out of the books he had read, and, mixing them with his own observations, digested them into a commonplacebook, which he did with so much industry and judgment that an eminent judge of the King's Bench borrowed it of him when he was Lord Chief Baron. He unwillingly lent it, because it had been written by him before he was called to the bar, and had never been thoroughly revised by him since that time; only what alterations had been made in the law, by subsequent statutes and judgments, were added by him as they had happened; but the judge, having perused it, said that, though it was composed by him so early, he did not think any lawyer in England could do it better.'" B. "His whole life (Sir Matthew Hale) was nothing else but a continual course of labor and industry. "He looked on readiness in arithmetic as a thing which might be useful to him in his own employment, and acquired it to such a degree that he would often, on a sudden, resolve very hard questions, which had puzzled the best accountants about town. "He studied algebra, and went through all the other mechanical sciences. "He was also very conversant in philosophical learning, and in all the various experiments and rare discoveries of this age, and had the new books written on these subjects sent him from all parts, which he both read and examined critically. Indeed, it will seem scarcely credible that a man so much employed, and of so severe a temper of mind, could find leisure to read, observe, and write so much of these subjects as he did. He called them his diversions; for he often said, when he was weary with the study of the law, or divinity, he used to recreate himself with philosophy or the mathematics. "To these he added great skill in physic, anatomy, and chirurgery. And he used to say, no man could be absolutely a master in any profession, without having some skill in other sciences. "To this he added great researches into ancient history. "Above all, he seemed to have made the study of divinity the chief of all others. "It seems extravagant, and almost incredible, that one man, in no great compass of years, should have acquired such a variety of knowledge; but as his parts were quick and his apprehensions lively, his memory great and his judgment strong, so his industry was almost indefatigable. He rose always betimes in the morning, was never idle, scarcely ever held any discourse about news, except with some few in whom he confided entirely. He spent |