highly-cultivated writer; he sate in his spacious library of well-
selected books, arranged with a finical preciseness, apportioning
his day between various literary pursuits. He made an income; he
wrote excellent ephemeral volumes; he gained a somewhat dreary
reputation. But Wordsworth, with his tiny bookshelf of odd tattered
volumes, with pages of manuscript interleaved to supply missing
passages, alone kept his heart and imagination active, by
deliberate leisure, elaborate sauntering, unashamed idleness.

The reason why very few uneducated persons have been writers of
note, is because they have been unable to take up the problem at
the right point. A writer cannot start absolutely afresh; he must
have the progress of thought behind him, and he must join the
procession in due order. Therefore the best outfit for a writer is
to have just enough cultivation to enable him to apprehend the
drift and development of thought, to discern the social and
emotional problems that are in the air, so that he can interpret--
that is the secret--the thoughts that are astir, but which have not
yet been brought to the birth. He must know enough and not too
much; he must not dim his perception by acquainting himself in
detail with what has been said or thought; he must not take off the
freshness of his mind by too much intellectual gymnastic. It is a
race across country for which he is preparing, and he will learn
better what the practical difficulties are by daring excursions of
his own, than by acquiring a formal suppleness in prescribed
exercises.

The originality and the output of the writer are conditioned by his
intellectual and vital energy. Most men require all their energy
for the ordinary pursuits of life; all creative work is the result