this respect England has been, and I hope always will be, an example to
the whole world. To this habit of willing and prompt obedience in
apprentices, in servants, in all inferiors in station, she owes, in a
great measure, her multitudes of matchless merchants, tradesmen, and
workmen of every description, and also the achievements of her armies
and navies. It is no disgrace, but the contrary, to obey, cheerfully,
lawful and just commands. None are so saucy and disobedient as slaves;
and, when you come to read history, you will find that in proportion as
nations have been _free_ has been their reverence for the laws. But,
there is a wide difference between lawful and cheerful obedience and
that servility which represents people as laying petitions 'at the
_king's feet_,' which makes us imagine that we behold the supplicants
actually crawling upon their bellies. There is something so abject in
this expression; there is such horrible self-abasement in it, that I do
hope that every youth, who shall read this, will hold in detestation the
reptiles who make use of it. In all other countries, the lowest
individual can put a petition into the _hands_ of the chief magistrate,
be he king or emperor: let us hope, that the time will yet come when
Englishmen will be able to do the same. In the meanwhile I beg you to
despise these worse than pagan parasites.

38. Hitherto I have addressed you chiefly relative to the things to be
_avoided_: let me now turn to the things which you ought _to do_. And,
first of all, the _husbanding of your time_. The respect that you will
receive, the real and _sincere respect_, will depend entirely on what
you are able _to do_. If you be rich, you may purchase what is called
respect; but it is not worth having. To obtain respect worth possessing,
you must, as I observed before, do more than the common run of men in
your state of life; and, to be enabled to do this, you must manage well
_your time_: and, to manage it well, you must have as much of the