estiny.

Perhaps I have taken needless trouble to furnish an excuse for my
autobiography. My age alone, my true age, would be reason enough for
my writing. I began life in the Middle Ages, as I shall prove, and
here am I still, your contemporary in the twentieth century, thrilling
with your latest thought.

Had I no better excuse for writing, I still might be driven to it by
my private needs. It is in one sense a matter of my personal
salvation. I was at a most impressionable age when I was transplanted
to the new soil. I was in that period when even normal children,
undisturbed in their customary environment, begin to explore their own
hearts, and endeavor to account for themselves and their world. And my
zest for self-exploration seems not to have been distracted by the
necessity of exploring a new outer universe. I embarked on a double
voyage of discovery, and an exciting life it was! I took note of
everything. I could no more keep my mind from the shifting, changing
landscape than an infant can keep his eyes from the shining candle
moved across his field of vision. Thus everything impressed itself on
my memory, and with double associations; for I was constantly
referring my new world to the old for comparison, and the old to the
new for elucidation. I became a student and philosopher by force of
circumstances.

Had I been brought to America a few years earlier, I might have
written that in such and such a year my father emigrated, just as I
would state what he did for a living, as a matter of family history.
Happening when it did, the emigration became of the most vital
importance to me personally. All the processes of uprooting,
transportation, replanting, acclimatization, and development took
place in my own soul. I felt the pang, the fear, the wonder, and the
joy of it. I can never forget, for I bear the scars. But I want to
forget--sometimes I long to forget. I think I have thoroughly
assimilated my past--I have done its bidding--I want now to be of
to-day. It is painful to be consciously of two worlds. The Wandering
Jew in me seeks forgetfulness. I am not afraid to live on and on, if
only I do not have to remember too much. A long past vividly
remembered is like a heavy garment that clings to your limbs when you
would run. And I have thought of a charm that should release me from
the folds of my clinging past. I take the hint from the Ancient
Mariner, who told his tale in order to be rid of it. I, too, will