This chapter's epigraph is from a famous line in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice . "Talent is more important / than hard work" . In other words, it's more important to be good at what you do than to do what you're good at. In this case, that means being good at music, art, writing, and so on. It's not that hard work is the only thing that's important in this passage, but it is definitely the most important thing.