e a little composed and reconciled to our
surroundings, as soon as we have appropriated some of its temperature,
we feel an extraordinary sense of satisfaction, as in bathing in cool
water; we assimilate ourselves to the new element, and cease to have
any necessary pre-occupation with our person. We devote our attention
undisturbed to our environment, to which we now feel ourselves
superior by being able to view it in an objective and disinterested
fashion, instead of being oppressed by it, as before.

* * * * *

When we are on a journey, and all kinds of remarkable objects press
themselves on our attention, the intellectual food which we receive is
often so large in amount that we have no time for digestion; and we
regret that the impressions which succeed one another so quickly leave
no permanent trace. But at bottom it is the same with travelling as
with reading. How often do we complain that we cannot remember one
thousandth part of what we read! In both cases, however, we may
console ourselves with the reflection that the things we see and read
make an impression on the mind before they are forgotten, and so
contribute to its formation and nurture; while that which we only
remember does no more than stuff it and puff it out, filling up its
hollows with matter that will always be strange to it, and leaving it
in itself a blank.

* * * * *

It is the very many and varied forms in which human life is presented
to us on our travels that make them entertaining. But we never see
more than its outside, such as is everywhere open to public view and
accessible to strangers. On the other hand, human life on its
inside, the heart and centre, where it lives and moves and shows its
character, and in particular that part of the inner side which could
be seen at home amongst our relatives, is not seen; we have exchanged
it for the outer side. This is why on our travels we see the world
like a painted landscape, with a very wide horizon, but no foreground;
and why, in time, we get tired of it.

* * * * *

One man is more concerned with the impression which he makes upon
the rest of mankind; another, with the impression which the rest of
mankind makes upon him. The disposition of the one is subjective; of
the other, objective; the one is, in the whole of his existence, more
in the nature of an idea which is merely presented; the othe