to the thing to be done and the conditions to be observed.
And why need we copy the Doric or the Gothic model? Beauty,
convenience, grandeur of thought and quaint expression are
as near to us as to any, and if the American artist will
study with hope and love the precise thing to be done by
him, considering the climate, the soil, the length of the
day, the wants of the people, the habit and form of the
government, he will create a house in which all these will
find themselves fitted, and taste and sentiment will be
satisfied also.

Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can
present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole
life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another
you have only an extemporaneous half possession. That which
each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him. No man
yet knows what it is, nor can, till that person has exhibited
it. Where is the master who could have taught Shakspeare?
Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or
Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique.
The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that part he could not
borrow. Shakspeare will never be made by the study of
Shakspeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot
hope too much or dare too much. There is at this moment for
you an utterance brave and grand as that of the colossal
chisel of Phidias, or trowel of the Egyptians, or the pen
of Moses or Dante, but different from all these. Not possibly
will the soul, all rich, all eloquent, with thousand-cloven
tongue, deign to repeat itself; but if you can hear what
these patriarchs say, surely you can reply to them in the