You cannot shut the windows of the sky,
Through which Aurora shews her bright’ning face;
You cannot bar my constant feet to trace
The woods and lawns by living stream at eve:
Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace,
And I these toys to the great children leave:
Of fancy, reason, virtue, nought can me bereave.”
A devotion to the common pleasures of sense is better than a state of absolute indifference; for even if these give no kind of pleasure, whilst all higher pursuits are neglected, there is danger lest a man become of the same opinion as Dr. Darwin’s patient, “that all which life affords is a ride out in the morning, and a warm parlour and a pack of cards in the afternoon;” and, like him, finding these pleasures not inexhaustible, should shoot himself because he has nothing better to do!
The miserable man should endeavour to make himself practically acquainted with the distresses of others. However desperate the circumstances of a person may be, he may still have it in his power to whisper a word of consolation to one whose situation may be more humiliating than his own.
Human nature is accused of much more selfishness than it has any just claim to; a thousand kindly emotions break in upon and redeem our daily and interested life.