" The only remedy for this green-sickness in youth is
physical exercise--action, work, and bodily occupation.
The use of early labour in self-imposed mechanical employments may
be illustrated by the boyhood of Sir Isaac Newton. Though a
comparatively dull scholar, he was very assiduous in the use of his
saw, hammer, and hatchet--"knocking and hammering in his lodging
room"--making models of windmills, carriages, and machines of all
sorts; and as he grew older, he took delight in making little
tables and cupboards for his friends. Smeaton, Watt, and
Stephenson, were equally handy with tools when mere boys; and but
for such kind of self-culture in their youth, it is doubtful
whether they would have accomplished so much in their manhood.
Such was also the early training of the great inventors and
mechanics described in the preceding pages, whose contrivance and
intelligence were practically trained by the constant use of their
hands in early life. Even where men belonging to the manual labour
class have risen above it, and become more purely intellectual
labourers, they have found the advantages of their early training
in their later pursuits. Elihu Burritt says he found hard labour
NECESSARY to enable him to study with effect; and more than once he
gave up school-teaching and study, and, taking to his leather-apron
again, went back to his blacksmith's forge and anvil for his health
of body and mind's sake.
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