I grant that it is an up-hill work that lies before you; but don't you think it is always easier to climb a mountain than it is to level it?
These books call on you to level the mountain; and that mountain is the property of other people, subdivided amongst a great many proprietors, and protected by law.

At the first stroke of the pickaxe, it is ten to one but what you are taken up for a trespass.

But the path up the mountain is a right of way uncontested.

You may be safe at the summit, before (even if the owners are fools enough to let you) you could have levelled a yard.

Cospetto!" quoth the doctor, "it is more than two thousand years ago since poor Plato began to level it, and the mountain is as high as ever!" Thus saying, Riccabocca came to the end of his pipe, and stalking thoughtfully away, he left Leonard Fairfield trying to extract light from the smoke..