Persons who are obstinate till they can give up their notions with a safe conscience, are troublesome intimates.

Often too the cold tardiness of decision is only the strict balancing of scepticism or candour, while obscurity as frequently may arise from the deficiency of previous knowledge in the listener.

It was said that NEWTON in conversation did not seem to understand his own writings, and it was supposed that his memory had decayed.

The fact, however, was not so; and Pemberton makes a curious distinction, which accounts for Newton _not always being ready to speak_ on subjects of which he was the sole master.

"Inventors seem to treasure up in their own minds what they have found out, after another manner than those do the same things that have not this inventive faculty.