A Well-Traveled Poem: Value of an Education
The following poem was written by my Great Great Grandmother...
We must love learning if we would possess it.
It belongs to education to determine when to act, and when to cease; when to reveal, and when to conceal; when to speak, and when to keep silence; when to give, and when to receive. Education regulates the measure of all things and provides the means of finding the end in every course of life.
In order for us to love learning, we must feel its delights; we must apply to it, however irksome at first, closely and constantly for a time. By so doing, we form habits that are not only pleasant but they are necessary to refine and polite manners.
By being educated we adorn our minds with a store of useful knowledge, improve our conducts, and honor and success in life is sure to be more apt to attend us. If we would possess an education, we must expect to study very hard. The Creator has so constituted the human intellect that it can only grow by its own action; and by its own action and free will, it will certainly grow.
We must therefore, educate ourselves. We may have books and teachers to help us, the work is ours. No one was ever born a Newton or an Edwards. It is a patient and continued application that makes the great minds.
