of detestability. Such gawks (_Gecken_) are they;
and foolish peacocks, and yet with such a vulturous hunger for
self-indulgence; so obstinate, obstreperous, vainglorious; in all
senses, so froward and so forward. No mortal's endeavour or attainment
will, in the smallest, content the as yet unendeavouring, unattaining
young gentleman; but he could make it all infinitely better, were it
worthy of him. Life everywhere is the most manageable matter, simple
as a question in the Rule-of-Three: multiply your second and third
term together, divide the product by the first, and your quotient will
be the answer,--which you are but an ass if you cannot come at. The
booby has not yet found-out, by any trial, that, do what one will,
there is ever a cursed fraction, oftenest a decimal repeater, and no
net integer quotient so much as to be thought of.'

In which passage does not there lie an implied confession that
Teufelsdroeckh himself, besides his outward obstructions, had an
inward, still greater, to contend with; namely, a certain temporary,
youthful, yet still afflictive derangement of head? Alas, on the
former side alone, his case was hard enough. 'It continues ever true,'
says he, 'that Saturn, or Chronos, or what we call TIME, devours all
his Children: only by incessant Running, by incessant Working, may you
(for some threescore-and-ten years) escape him; and you too he devours
at last. Can any Sovereign, or Holy Alliance of Sovereigns, bid Time
stand still; even in thought, shake themselves free of Time? Our whole
terrestrial being is based on Time, and built of Time; it is wholly a
Movement, a Time-impulse; Time is the author of it, the material of
it. Hence also our Whole Duty, which is to move, to work,--in the
right direction. Are not our Bodies and our Souls in continual
movement, whether we will or not; in a continual Waste, requiring a
continual Repair? Utmost satisfaction of our whole outward and inward
Wants were but satisfaction for a space of Time; thus, whatso we have
done, is done, and for us annihilated, and ever must we go and do
anew. O Time-Spirit, how hast thou environed and imprisoned us, and
sunk us so deep in thy troublous dim Time-Element, that only in lucid
moments can so much as glimpses of our upper Azure Home be revealed to
us! Me, however, as a Son of Time, unhappier than some others, was
Time threatening to eat quite prematurely; for, strive as I might,
there was no good Running, so obstructed wa