ated by the
belief that I have a distinct mission in life--a chance for usefulness
that might never have been mine had I enjoyed unbroken health and
uninterrupted liberty.

The last few months of my life in the hospital were much alike, save
that each succeeding one brought with it an increased amount of
liberty. My hours now passed pleasantly. Time did not drag, for I was
engaged upon some enterprise every minute. I would draw, read, write,
or talk. If any feeling was dominant, it was my feeling for art; and I
read with avidity books on the technique of that subject. Strange as it
may seem, however, the moment I again found myself in the world of
business my desire to become an artist died almost as suddenly as it
had been born. Though my artistic ambition was clearly an outgrowth of
my abnormal condition, and languished when normality asserted itself, I
am inclined to believe I should even now take a lively interest in the
study of art if I were so situated as to be deprived of a free choice
of my activities. The use of words later enthralled me because so
eminently suited to my purposes.

During the summer of 1903, friends and relatives often called to see
me. The talks we had were of great and lasting benefit to me. Though I
had rid myself of my more extravagant and impossible delusions of
grandeur--flying-machines and the like--I still discussed with intense
earnestness other schemes, which, though allied to delusions of
grandeur, were, in truth, still more closely allied to sanity itself.
My talk was of that high, but perhaps suspicious type in which
Imagination overrules Common Sense. Lingering delusions, as it were,
made great projects seem easy. That they were at least feasible under
certain conditions, my mentors admitted. Only I was in an abnormal
hurry to produce results. Work that I later realized could not be
accomplished in less than five or ten years, if, indeed, in a lifetime,
I then believed could be accomplished in a year or two, and by me
single-handed. Had I had none but mentally unbalanced people to talk
with, I might have continued to cherish a distorted perspective. It was
the unanimity of sane opinions that helped me to correct my own views;
and I am confident that each talk with relatives and friends hastened
my return to normality.

Though I was not discharged from the State Hospital until September
10th, 1903, during the preceding month I visited my home several times,
once for three days