She makes familiar with a heaven unseen,
And shows him glories yet to be reveal’d.
END OF PART I.
SOLITUDE.
PART II.
THE PERNICIOUS INFLUENCE OF A TOTAL SECLUSION FROM SOCIETY UPON THE MIND AND THE HEART.
CHAPTER I.
Introduction.
Solitude, in its strict and literal acceptation, is equally unfriendly to the happiness, and foreign to the nature of mankind. An inclination to exercise the faculty of speech, to interchange the sentiments of the mind, to indulge the affections of the heart, and to receive themselves, while they bestow on others, a kind assistance and support, drives men, by an ever active, and almost irresistible impulse, from solitude to society: and teaches them that the highest temporal felicity they are capable of enjoying, must be sought for in a suitable union of the sexes, and in a friendly intercourse with their fellow creatures. The profoundest deductions of reason, the highest flights of fancy, the finest sensibilities of the heart, the happiest discoveries of science, and the most valuable productions of art, are feebly felt, and imperfectly enjoyed, in the cold and cheerless regions of solitude. It is not to the senseless rock, or to the passing gale, that we can satisfactorily communicate our pleasures and our pains. The heavy sighs which incessantly transpire from the vacant bosoms of the solitary hermit and the surly misanthropist, indicate the absence of those high delights which ever accompany congenial sentiment and mutual affection. The soul sinks under a situation in which there are no kindred bosoms to participate its joys, and sympathise in its sorrows; and feels, strongly feels, that the beneficent Creator has so framed and moulded the temper of our minds, that society is the earliest impulse and the most powerful inclination of our hearts.