though he had tried to bear up cheerily under his early cares, they
had sunk in deep. 'We speak of life as a journey,' he said, 'but
how differently is that journey performed! Some are borne along
their path in luxury and ease; while some must walk it with naked
feet, mangled and bleeding.'

Who is there that does not sometimes, on a quiet evening, even
before he has attained to middle age, sit down and look back upon
his college days, and his college friends; and think sadly of the
failures, the disappointments, the broken hearts, which have been
among those who all started fair and promised well? How very much
has after life changed the estimates which we, formed in those
days, of the intellectual mark and probable fate of one's friends
and acquaintances! You remember the dense, stolid dunces of that
time: you remember the men who sat next you in the lecture-room,
and never answered rightly a question that was put to them: you
remember how you used to wonder if they would always be the dunces
they were then. Well, I never knew a man who was a dunce at twenty,
to prove what might be called a brilliant or even a clever man in
after life; but we have all known such do wonderfully decently.
You did not expect much of them, you see. You did not try them by
an exacting standard. If a monkey were to write his name, you would
be so much surprised at seeing him do it at all, that you would
never think of being surprised that he did not do it very well. So,
if a man you knew as a remarkably stupid fellow preaches a decent
sermon, you hardly think of remarking that it is very common-place
and dull, you are so much pleased and surprised' to find that the
man can preach at all. And then, the dunces of college days are
often sensible, though slow and in this world, plain plodding common
sense is very likely in the long run to beat erratic brilliancy.