It
is only later on that a gradual approach takes place between these two
kinds of knowledge, accompanied by a mutual correction of error; and
knowledge is not mature until this coalition is accomplished. This
maturity or perfection of knowledge is something quite independent of
another kind of perfection, which may be of a high or a low order--the
perfection, I mean, to which a man may bring his own individual
faculties; which is measured, not by any correspondence between the
two kinds of knowledge, but by the degree of intensity which each kind
attains.
For the practical man the most needful thing is to acquire an accurate
and profound knowledge of _the ways of the world_. But this, though
the most needful, is also the most wearisome of all studies, as a man
may reach a great age without coming to the end of his task; whereas,
in the domain of the sciences, he masters the more important facts
when he is still young. In acquiring that knowledge of the world, it
is while he is a novice, namely, in boyhood and in youth, that the
first and hardest lessons are put before him; but it often happens
that even in later years there is still a great deal to be learned.
The study is difficult enough in itself; but the difficulty is doubled
by _novels_, which represent a state of things in life and the world,
such as, in fact, does not exist.
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