I was pleased, for a while, with the novelty of independence, and
imagined that I had now found what every man desires. My time was in my
own power, and my habitation was wherever my choice should fix it. I
amused myself for two years in passing from place to place, and
comparing one convenience with another; but being at last ashamed of
inquiry, and weary of uncertainty, I purchased a house, and established
my family.
I now expected to begin to be happy, and was happy for a short time with
that expectation. But I soon perceived my spirits to subside, and my
imagination to grow dark. The gloom thickened every day round me. I
wondered by what malignant power my peace was blasted, till I discovered
at last that I had nothing to do.
Time, with all its celerity, moves slowly to him whose whole employment
is to watch its flight. I am forced upon a thousand shifts to enable me
to endure the tediousness of the day. I rise when I can sleep no longer,
and take my morning-walk; I see what I have seen before, and return. I
sit down, and persuade myself that I sit down to think; find it
impossible to think without a subject, rise up to inquire after news,
and endeavour to kindle in myself an artificial impatience for
intelligence of events, which will never extend any consequence to me,
but that, a few minutes, they abstract me from myself.
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