Other related topics at:
All In Your Mind
1,205. Awe;
Effort; Intimidation;
Patience
"It is common for those who have never accustomed themselves to
the labour of inquiry, nor invigorated their confidence by
conquests over difficulty, to sleep in the gloomy quiescence of
astonishment, without any effort to animate inquiry or dispel
obscurity. What they cannot immediately conceive they consider
as too high to be reached, or too extensive to be comprehended;
they therefore content themselves with the gaze of folly, forbear
to attempt what they have no hopes of performing; and resign the
pleasure of rational contemplation to more pertinacious study or
more active faculties."
Johnson: Rambler #137 (July 9, 1751)
Link
1,206. Awe; Patience; Teamwork
"Among the productions of mechanic art many are of a form so
different from that of their first materials, and many consist of
parts so numerous and so nicely adapted to each other, that it is
not possible to view them without amazement. But when we enter
the shops of artificers, observe the various tools by which by
which every operation is facilitated, and trace the progress of a
manufacture through the different hands that, in succession to
each other, contribute to its perfection, we soon discover that
every single man has an easy task, and that the extremes, however
remote, of natural rudeness and artificial elegance are joined by
a regular concatenation of effects, of which every one is
introduced by that which precedes it, and equally introduces that
which is to follow."
Johnson: Rambler #137 (July 9, 1751)
Link
1,207. Awe; Fear; Intimidation
"Long calculations or complex diagrams affright the timorous and
unexperienced from a second view; but if we have skill
sufficient to analyze them into simple principles, it will be
discovered that our fear was groundless. Divide and
conquer is a principle equally just in science as in policy.
Complication is a species of confederacy, which, while it
continues united, bids defiance to the most active and vigorous
intellect; but of which every member is separately weak, and
which may, therefore, be quickly subdued if it can once be
broken."
Johnson: Rambler #137 (July 9, 1751)
Link
