11～15

11.One day Father suddenly remembered an intention of his to have us taught music. There were numerous other things that he felt every boy ought to learn, such as swimming, blacking his own shoes, to say nothing of school work, in which he expected a boy to excel. He now recalled that music, too, should be included in our education. He held that all children should be taught to play on something, and sing. He was right, perhaps. At any rate, there is a great deal to be said for his program. On the other hand, there are children and children. I had no ear for music.

 
12.Owing to the productivity of machines, much less work than was formerly necessary is now needed to maintain a tolerable standard of comfort in the human race. Some careful writers maintain that one hour's work a day would suffice, but perhaps this estimate does not take sufficient account of Asia. I shall assume, in order to be quite sure of being on the safe side, that four hours' work a day on the part of all adults would suffice to produce as much material comfort as reasonable people ought to desire.

 
13.A stout old lady was walking with her basket down the middle of a street in Petrograd to the great confusion of the traffic and with no small peril to herself. It was pointed out to her that the pavement was the place for foot-passengers, but she replied: “I'm going to walk where I like. We've got the liberty now.” It did not occur to the dear old lady that if liberty entitled the foot passenger to walk down the middle of the road it also entitled the cab-driver to drive on the pavement, and that the end of such liberty would be universal chaos. Everybody would be getting in everybody else's way and nobody would get anywhere. Individual liberty would have become social anarchy.

 
14.As of all other good things, one can have too much even of reading. Indulged in to excess, reading becomes a vice—a vice all the more dangerous for not being recognized as such. Yet excessive reading is the only form of self-indulgence which fails to get the blame it deserves.

15.On arriving at Liverpool, I made the acquaintance of a man who had been in America some years previously, and not having his hopes realized at that time, had returned desperate to England, taken in a fresh cargo of hopes, and was now making a second attempt with as much enthusiasm, if not more, than others in making their first.