Farcical fools, trying to idealize labour. You'll never succeed in idealizing hard work. Before you can dig mother earth you've got to take off your ideal jacket. The harder a man works, at brute labour, the thinner becomes his idealism, the darker his mind. And the harder a man works at mental labour, at idealism, at transcendental occupations, the thinner becomes his blood, and the more brittle his nerves.
Oh, the brittle-nerved brookfarmers!
You've got to be able to do both: the mental work, and the brute work. But be prepared to step from one pair of shoes into another. Don't try and make it all one pair of shoes.
The attempt to idealize the blood!
Nathaniel knew he was a fool, attempting it.
He went home to his amiable spouse and his sanctum sanctorum of a study.
Nathaniel!
But the Blithedale Romance. It has a beautiful, wintry-evening farm-kitchen sort of opening.
Dramatis Personæ:
1. I.—The narrator: whom we will call Nathaniel. A wisp of a sensitive, withal deep, literary young man no longer so very young.