68
Men are never taught to be gentlemen, and are taught everything else; and they never plume themselves so much on the rest of their knowledge as on knowing how to be gentlemen. They only plume themselves on knowing the one thing they do not know.
69
The infinites, the mean.—When we read too fast or too slowly, we understand nothing.
70
Nature . . .—[Nature has set us so well in the centre, that if we change one side of the balance, we change the other also. I act. Τά ζῶα τρέχει.[1] This makes me believe that the springs in our brain are so adjusted that he who touches one touches also its contrary.]
71
Too much and too little wine. Give him none, he cannot find truth; give him too much, the same.
72
Man's disproportion.—[This is where our innate knowledge leads us. If it be not true, there is no truth in man; and if it be true, he finds therein great cause for humiliation, being compelled to abase himself in one way or another. And since he cannot exist without this knowledge, I wish that, before entering on deeper researches into nature, he would consider her both seriously and at leisure, that he would reflect upon himself also, and knowing what proportion there is. . . .] Let man then contemplate the whole of nature in her full and grand majesty, and turn his vision from the low objects which surround him. Let him gaze on that brilliant light, set like an eternal lamp to illumine
- ↑ "Animals run."
