My Education Was Neglected, Yet I Was

What Are We, The Inhabitants Of This Globe, Least Among The Many That People Infinite Space? Our Minds Embrace Infinity; The Visible Mechanism Of Our Being Is Subject To Merest Accident.

Even Where The Affections Are Not Strongly Moved By Any Superior Excellence, The Companions Of Our Childhood Always Possess A Certain Power Over Our Minds Which Hardly Any Later Friend Can Obtain. They Know Our Infantine Dispositions, Which, However They May Be Afterwards Modified, Are Never Eradicated; And They Can Judge Of Our Actions With More Certain Conclusions As To The Integrity Of Our Motives.

The Moon Gazed On My Midnight Labours, While, With Unrelaxed And Breathless Eagerness, I Pursued Nature To Her Hiding Places.

The Day Of My Departure At Length Arrived. Clerval Spent The Last Evening With Us. He Had Endeavoured To Persuade His Father To Permit Him To Accompany Me And To Become My Fellow Student, But In Vain. His Father Was A Narrow-minded Trader, And Saw Idleness And Ruin In The Aspirations And Ambition Of His Son. Henry Deeply Felt The Misfortune Of Being Debarred From A Liberal Education. He Said Little, But When He Spoke I Read In His Kindling Eye And In His Animated Glance A Restrained But Firm Resolve Not To Be Chained To The Miserable Details Of Commerce.

Life Is Obstinate And Clings Closest Where It Is Most Hated.