“Who is your leader, and commands you?”
“The father of our tribe—if I choose to obey him,” said the guide, “otherwise I have no commander.”
“You are, then,” said the wondering querist, “destitute of all that other men are combined by—you have no law, no leader, no settled means of subsistence, no house or home. You have, may Heaven compassionate you, no country—and, may Heaven enlighten and forgive you, you have no God! What is it that remains to you, deprived of government, domestic happiness, and religion?”
“I have liberty,” said the Bohemian “I crouch to no one, obey no one—respect no one—I go where I will—live as I can—and die when my day comes.”
“But you are subject to instant execution, at the pleasure of the Judge?”
“Be it so,” returned the Bohemian, “I can but die so much the sooner.”
“And to imprisonment also,” said the Scot, “and where, then, is your boasted freedom?”
“In my thoughts,” said the Bohemian, “which no chains can bind, while yours, even when your limbs are free, remain fettered by your laws and your superstitions, your dreams of local attachment, and your fantastic visions of civil policy. Such as I are free in spirit when our limbs are chained.—You are imprisoned in mind even when your limbs are most at freedom.”
“Yet the freedom of your thoughts,” said the Scot, “relieves not the pressure of the gyves on your limbs.”
“For a brief time that may be endured,” answered the vagrant, “and if within that period I cannot extricate myself, and fail of relief from my comrades, I can always die, and death is the most perfect freedom of all.”