Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, Fifth Series, No. 112, Vol. III, February 20, 1886

Synopsis

The old maxim regarding the power of habit is usually and rightly regarded as exhibiting a thorough application to the regulation of animal life. Not merely in human affairs is habit allowed to be ‘a second nature;’ but in lower life as well, the influence of use and wont is plainly perceptible. A dog or cat equally with a human being is under the sway of the accustomed. That which may be at first unusual, soon becomes the normal way of life.

Even, as the physiologist can prove, in a very large part of ordinary human existence, we are the creatures of habit quite as much as we are the children of impulse. It is easily provable, for example, that such common acts as are involved in reading, writing, and speaking, are merely perpetuated habits. At first, these acquirements present difficulties to the youthful mind. 

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