THE ENTOMOLOGIST’S 
WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER, 
No. 76.] SATURDAY, MARCH 13, 1858. [Price U . 
BUSY. 
Few leaders have produced us more 
remonstrances from our correspondents 
than did that with the heading “ Busy.” 
Unfortunately the word is often spe- 
cially applied not to those who are 
great workers, but to those who make 
a great show of working; and one 
correspondent directs our attention to 
the fact that busy people are often 
essentially mischievous, and that it 
would have been well for others had 
they not been quite so busily em- 
ployed. Another writes to us and 
says, “ What miserable performances 
must have been the sermons, articles 
and papers of the poor, jaded Lanca- 
shire Incumbent!” Our friend must 
surely be jealous of the prodigality of 
labour of the correspondent of ‘ The 
Times,’ and therefore comforts him- 
self by abusing what he cannot 
imitate. 
It has often been remarked that 
the lazy boys are always those who 
are most apt to deduce a moral from 
the injurious effects which are some- 
times seen resulting from over-study ; 
it is to them a good excuse for idle- 
ness, that it is bad for the health to 
work too hard, and of course they 
think they can best judge in their 
own cases what amount of work would 
be too hard for them. 
The Latin proverb, “Non multa, sed 
multum,” is often quoted against those 
who would squander their energies on 
a multitude of things without attaining 
proficiency in any. Now w'e have never 
advocated that tendency to diffusive- 
ness, which is, alas! but too common, 
and one needs not to have lived to a 
very great age without observing that 
those who excel in any one branch 
of learning are far more likely to 
pride themselves on what they have 
done in other directions, just as clever 
musicians may be vain of their very 
inferior attempts at painting, whereas 
a clever painter perhaps goes out of 
his way to shine as a second-rate 
man of science, and another person, 
very learned in some of the -ologies, 
will achieve a poem, and then be far 
more proud of his skill in versification 
than of his elaborate papers on optics 
and astronomy. 
A little well done is better than a 
great deal ill done. But yet, to re- 
turn to our first text, much time is 
unnecessarily wasted by those who 
have not fully developed their organs 
of order and method, and we can- 
not recommend our readers to console 
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