This is a
fact, too, which Mr Helps has noted. 'A suggestion,' says he, 'may be
ever so old; but it is not exhausted until it is acted upon, or
rejected on sufficient reason.' He has, therefore, no fastidious dread
of saying anything which has been said before, but readily welcomes
wise thoughts from all directions, often reproducing them with such
felicity of expression, as to give them new effect. Thus, in all the
elements of a profitable originality, he is rich and generous; and
from few books of modern times could so large a store of aphorisms,
fine sayings, and admirable observations be selected. We have marked a
great many more than can be incorporated in the present paper; but
some few may be, nevertheless, presented. Here, for instance, is a
fine remark on time--next to love, the most hackneyed subject in the
world:--'Men seldom feel as if they were bounded as to time: they
think they can afford to throw away a great deal of that commodity;
_thus shewing unconsciously in their trifling the sense that they have
of their immortality_.
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