Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889
Hours of Sleep and Hours of Study
By Samuel Osgood (18121880)T
As to hours of study, they should never exceed those now made the limit of manual labor—ten hours—and I believe that six hours of close application will in the long run accomplish more good work than twelve hours. If a youth actually studies six hours, and adds to this the time spent in going to and from recitation and in waiting for others to recite, he will find very little of the working part of the day left. If we add to six hours of actual work over books the time usually given by an earnest student to thought, and reading, and instructive conversation, it will be found that twelve out of the twenty-four hours are generally given to the culture of the mind. Stating my views in another way, I can say that there is wisdom in dividing the day into three parts of eight hours each—one part for sleep; one for such exertion of the mind as may be called study, whether learning lessons or tasking the thoughts by solid reading or careful meditation; one part for recreation, or for all that refreshes soul and body by food, exercise, society, and all such intellectual occupations as belong more to the play rather than to the work of the mind. I do not, of course, mean to say that these three parts should be separated by a rigid line, and that recreation and study should occupy each eight consecutive hours. It is best for one not to give more than two consecutive hours to one object; and he is wise who goes from one study to another, or intersperses study with exercise or conversation, so as to secure constant freshness and life. The Jesuits, who are marvellously shrewd in their way, forbid their pupils from studying more than two hours without intermission; and Voltaire, who so hated the Jesuits, copied their sagacity by keeping sometimes four desks in his library, with an unfinished work on each, and going, as he was moved, from one to the other, as poetry, history, criticism, or philosophy invited him. You will do well to study a judicious alternation in the division of your time and studies, being especially careful to sweeten hard and repulsive branches by such as are more pleasant, and in every way to change the posture of your mind, so as to refresh and relieve the more weary faculties.