ESSAY.
No. I.
“Variety we still pursue,
“In pleasure seek for something new.”
Swift.
In man there is a natural love of change and variety: the mind is wearied by continual succession of similar objects, those pleasures which at first were capable of inspiring emotions of delight; which once filled the heart with rapture and enthusiasm; as they become familiar, fade by degrees, they lose their brilliancy, the charm of novelty is gone, and soon they please no more. The sublimer works of nature, which have roused the attention of the traveller, excite not similar sensations in the bosoms of those who have been long acquainted with their beauties: the lofty mountain “with its robe of mist,” the stupenduous cliff that overlooks the torrent, and the loud sounding waters of the tremendous cataract, neither strike them with veneration nor with awe. Their eyes wander with languor and indifference, over those scenes in which nature has been most lavish of its beauties. The mind is attracted by diversity, we follow with avidity any object which appears fascinating and pleasing, until some fresh pursuit which fancy has furnished with superior charms captivates the imagination. This love of variety is predominant in the breast of every individual, it alike exists in the lowly cottage and the splendid palace, in the circles of business and in the vortex of pleasure, in the obscure paths of folly and ignorance, and in the exalted walks of literature and science: and although those objects which at a distance appeared dazling and beautiful, may lose their brightness on a nearer approach, still the acquirements which have cost us much labor and pain, have something in them peculiarly grateful. Man has ever been considered as a fickle and inconstant being, rarely content with his present situation, but continually looking out for brighter and fairer prospects. This restlessness of the human mind has been considered by some rigid moralists, as a source of trouble and vexation to those who are under its influence, but it is also a source of our greatest enjoyments: cold must be that heart, which is insensible to all the charms of variety, and but little calculated to partake of present joys, or to anticipate the more sublime and exalted pleasures which are hid behind the impenetrable veil of futurity.
A. D.
December 31, 1796.
The reference to “the lofty mountain ‘with its robe of mist’,” may be from an article on Ossian in the New-York Magazine, Vol. 5, 1791.