32 LETTERS TO BROTHER JOHN. 



to refer back, and read again ; and every now and 

 then shut your eyes., and so endeavour to ascertain 

 whether you clearly understand what you have just 

 read or not, and by no means proceed to a second 

 sentence before you have fully understood the first. 

 Pardon this earnestness ; and if I have been some- 

 what tedious or tautological, you must pardon that 

 too, for I am extremely anxious that you should 

 obtain a distinct conception of the nature of this 

 amazing part of our structure; otherwise I shall 

 have lost both my time and labour, and it will be 

 impossible for you to understand me when I come 

 to speak of diet, the conduct of life as it relates 

 to the preservation of health, the origin of dis- 

 ease, &c. &c., all of which have a direct reference 

 to this same ultimate tissue. It is, besides, the 

 most beautiful, the most wonderful, the most im- 

 portant structure in the human fabric, magnificent 

 in its very simplicity, stupendous in its very 

 minuteness; and it is the secret chamber in which 

 Nature conducts all her hidden operations. Hither 

 are brought, and dealt with, by that subtle and 

 mysterious Operator, all the elements necessary to 

 the production of a Newton, or a Montaigne; a 

 Howard, or a Robespierre ; a Richard the First of 

 England, or a Lewis the Eleventh of France ; a 



