"Something!-It is wisdom in a nut-shell. There's more philosophy in it than in three hundred folios."
"Well, ifI thought—”
"Thought! never think of it at all-you have been all your life thinking to no purpose-it is time for you to act now. Hav'n't I proved that you must be a gainer either way?"
"Well- well-I believe-I think-I'll think of it."
"Think of a fiddlestick. Do you think a man is the better prepared for a cold bath, by standing half an hour shivering on the brink ? No- no-fall in love extempore ; you have no time to study characters-and if you had, do you think a man is the wiser for studying a riddle he is destined never to find out? Mark what the poet says.
"What poet?"
"Hang me, if I know, or care, but he sings directly to my purpose, and is therefore a sensible fellow. ' List-list-O list, ' as the tailor said.
Love is no child of time, unless it be
The offspring of a moment—O, true love
Requires no blowing of the lingering spark
To light it to a wild consuming flame.
To linger on through years of sighing dolours,
To write, to reason to persuade, to worry,
Some cold heart into something like an ague—
An icy shivering fit-this is not love;
'Tis habit, friendship, such as that we feel
For some old tree because we've known it long—
No, Tom-all this is but to put the heart at nurse,
Or send it like a lazy school-boy forth
Unwillingly to learn his A B C,
Under some graybeard, flogging pedagogue.
Time's office is to throw cold water on,
Not feed the flame with oil."
"And you have been married thirteen years?"
"Yes, and have twelve children , yet I can talk of love—aye, and feel it to. Come, I have a little party at home this evening; come—see-and be conquered."
"Well," said I, starting up, "wait till I make myself a little amiable."
"No-no-I know you of old. If you once have time to consider you'll get becalmed as sure as a gun. Now or never —this is the crisis of thy fate."
Riding on horseback had made me bold, and I suffered myself to be carried off to the party by my merry friend ; who predicted fifty times by the way, that I would be married in less than three weeks.
It was fortunate the distance was small, or my courage would