{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_652/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_652","id":"gutenberg_652","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/652","summary":null,"tags":["Best Books Ever Listings","Category: British Literature","Category: Novels","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Ethiopia -- Fiction","Happiness -- Fiction","Princes -- Fiction","Satire"],"text":"Transcribed from the 1889 Cassell & Company edition by David Price, email\nccx074@pglaf.org\n\n                          [Picture: Book cover]\n\n                       CASSELL\u2019S NATIONAL LIBRARY.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n\n\n\n\n                                 RASSELAS\n                           PRINCE OF ABYSSINIA\n\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                    BY\n\n                          SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D.\n\n                       [Picture: Decorative image]\n\n                       CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED:\n                        LONDON, PARIS & MELBOURNE.\n                                  1889.\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\n\nRASSELAS was written by Samuel Johnson in the year 1759, when his age was\nfifty.  He had written his _London_ in 1738; his _Vanity of Human Wishes_\nin 1740; his _Rambler_ between March, 1750, and March, 1752.  In 1755 his\n_Dictionary_ had appeared, and Dublin, by giving him its honorary LL.D.,\nhad enabled his friends to call him \u201cDoctor\u201d Johnson.  His friends were\nmany, and his honour among men was great.  He owed them to his union of\nintellectual power with unflinching probity.  But he had worked hard,\nbattling against the wolf without, and the black dog within\u2014poverty and\nhypochondria.  He was still poor, though his personal wants did not\nexceed a hundred pounds a year.  His wife had been seven years dead, and\nhe missed her sorely.  His old mother, who lived to the age of ninety,\ndied poor in January of this year, 1759.  In her old age, Johnson had\nsought to help her from his earnings.  At her death there were some\nlittle debts, and there were costs of burial.  That he might earn enough\nto pay them he wrote _Rasselas_.\n\n_Rasselas_ was written in the evenings of one week, and sent to press\nwhile being written.  Johnson earned by it a hundred pounds, with\ntwenty-five pounds more for a second edition.  It was published in March\nor April; Johnson never read it after it had been published until more\nthan twenty years afterwards.  Then, finding it in a chaise with Boswell,\nhe took it up and read it eagerly.\n\nThis is one of Johnson\u2019s letters to his mother, written after he knew\nthat her last illness had come upon her.  It is dated about ten days\nbefore her death.  The \u201cMiss\u201d referred to in it was a faithful friend.\n\u201cMiss\u201d was his home name for an affectionate step-daughter, Lucy Porter:\u2014\n\n    \u201cHONOURED MADAM,\u2014\n\n    \u201cThe account which Miss gives me of your health pierces my heart.\n    God comfort and preserve you, and save you, for the sake of Jesus\n    Christ.\n\n    \u201cI would have Miss read to you from time to time the Passion of our\n    Saviour; and sometimes the sentences in the Communion Service\n    beginning\u2014\u2019Come unto me, all ye that travail and are heavy laden, and\n    I will give you rest.\u2019\n\n    \u201cI have just now read a physical book which inclines me to think that\n    a strong infusion of the bark would do you good.  Do, dear mother,\n    try it.\n\n    \u201cPray, send me your blessing, and forgive all that I have done amiss\n    to you.  And whatever you would have done, and what debts you would\n    have paid first, or anything else that you would direct, let Miss put\n    it down; I shall endeavour to obey you.\n\n    \u201cI have got twelve guineas to send you\u201d [six were borrowed.  There\n    was a note in Johnson\u2019s Diary of six guineas repaid to Allen, the\n    printer, who had lent them when he wanted to send money to his dying\n    mother], \u201cbut unhappily am at a loss how to send it to-night.  If I\n    cannot send it to-night, it will come by the next post.\n\n    \u201cPray, do not omit anything mentioned in this letter.  God bless you\n    for ever and ever.\n\n                                                                    \u201cI am,\n                                                        \u201cYour dutiful Son,\n                                                            \u201cSAM. JOHNSON.\n\n    \u201c_Jan._ 13, 1759.\u201d\n\nThat is the personal side of the tale of _Rasselas_.  In that way Johnson\nsuddenly, on urgent pressure, carried out a design that had been in his\nmind.  The success of Eastern tales, written as a form of moral essay, in\nthe _Rambler_ and _Adventurer_, upon suggestion, no doubt, of Addison\u2019s\n_Vision of Mirza_, had prompted him to express his view of life more\nfully than in essay form by way of Oriental apologue; and his early work\non Father Lobo\u2019s Voyage to Abyssinia, caused him to choose Abyssinia for\nthe land in which to lay his fable.\n\nBut Johnson\u2019s _Rasselas_ has also a close relation to the time when it\nwas written, as Johnson himself had to the time in which he lived.  From\nthe beginning of the century\u2014and especially, in England, since the\nbeginning of the reign of George the Second\u2014there had been a growing\nsense of the ills of life, associated in some minds with doubt whether\nthere could be a just God ruling this unhappy world.  Hard problems of\nhumanity pressed more and more on earnest minds.  The feeling expressed\nin Johnson\u2019s _Vanity of Human __Wishes_ had deepened everywhere by the\nyear 1759.  This has intense expression in _Rasselas_, where all the joys\nof life, without active use of the energies of life, can give no joy; and\nwhere all uses of the energies of men are for the attainment of ideals\nworthless or delusive.  This life was to Johnson, and to almost all the\nearnest thinkers of his time, unhappy in itself\u2014a school-house where the\nrod was ever active.  But in its unhappiness Johnson found no power that\ncould overthrow his faith.  To him this world was but a place of\neducation for the happiness that would be to the faithful in the world to\ncome.  There was a great dread for him in the question, Who shall be\nfound faithful?  But there was no doubt in his mind that the happiness of\nman is to be found only beyond the grave.  This was a feeling spread\nthrough Europe in the darkness gathering before the outburst of the storm\nof the great French Revolution.  Even Gray, in his _Ode on a Distant\nProspect of Eton College_, regarded Eton boys at their sports as \u201clittle\nvictims,\u201d unconscious of the doom of miseries awaiting them in life.\nThus Johnson\u2019s _Rasselas_ is a book doubly typical.  We have in it the\nspirit of the writer when it best expressed the spirit of his time.\n\n                                                                     H. M.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\nDESCRIPTION OF A PALACE IN A VALLEY.\n\n\nYE who listen with credulity to the whispers of fancy, and pursue with\neagerness the phantoms of hope; who expect that age will perform the\npromises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day will be\nsupplied by the morrow, attend to the history of Rasselas, Prince of\nAbyssinia.\n\nRasselas was the fourth son of the mighty Emperor in whose dominions the\nfather of waters begins his course\u2014whose bounty pours down the streams of\nplenty, and scatters over the world the harvests of Egypt.\n\nAccording to the custom which has descended from age to age among the\nmonarchs of the torrid zone, Rasselas was confined in a private palace,\nwith the other sons and daughters of Abyssinian royalty, till the order\nof succession should call him to the throne.\n\nThe place which the wisdom or policy of antiquity had destined for the\nresidence of the Abyssinian princes was a spacious valley in the kingdom\nof Amhara, surrounded on every side by mountains, of which the summits\noverhang the middle part.  The only passage by which it could be entered\nwas a cavern that passed under a rock, of which it had long been disputed\nwhether it was the work of nature or of human industry.  The outlet of\nthe cavern was concealed by a thick wood, and the mouth which opened into\nthe valley was closed with gates of iron, forged by the artificers of\nancient days, so massive that no man, without the help of engines, could\nopen or shut them.\n\nFrom the mountains on every side rivulets descended that filled all the\nvalley with verdure and fertility, and formed a lake in the middle,\ninhabited by fish of every species, and frequented by every fowl whom\nnature has taught to dip the wing in water.  This lake discharged its\nsuperfluities by a stream, which entered a dark cleft of the mountain on\nthe northern side, and fell with dreadful noise from precipice to\nprecipice till it was heard no more.\n\nThe sides of the mountains were covered with trees, the banks of the\nbrooks were diversified with flowers; every blast shook spices from the\nrocks, and every month dropped fruits upon the ground.  All animals that\nbite the grass or browse the shrubs, whether wild or tame, wandered in\nthis extensive circuit, secured from beasts of prey by the mountains\nwhich confined them.  On one part were flocks and herds feeding in the\npastures, on another all the beasts of chase frisking in the lawns, the\nsprightly kid was bounding on the rocks, the subtle monkey frolicking in\nthe trees, and the solemn elephant reposing in the shade.  All the\ndiversities of the world were brought together, the blessings of nature\nwere collected, and its evils extracted and excluded.\n\nThe valley, wide and fruitful, supplied its inhabitants with all the\nnecessaries of life, and all delights and superfluities were added at the\nannual visit which the Emperor paid his children, when the iron gate was\nopened to the sound of music, and during eight days every one that\nresided in the valley was required to propose whatever might contribute\nto make seclusion pleasant, to fill up the vacancies of attention, and\nlessen the tediousness of time.  Every desire was immediately granted.\nAll the artificers of pleasure were called to gladden the festivity; the\nmusicians exerted the power of harmony, and the dancers showed their\nactivity before the princes, in hopes that they should pass their lives\nin blissful captivity, to which those only were admitted whose\nperformance was thought able to add novelty to luxury.  Such was the\nappearance of security and delight which this retirement afforded, that\nthey to whom it was new always desired that it might be perpetual; and as\nthose on whom the iron gate had once closed were never suffered to\nreturn, the effect of longer experience could not be known.  Thus every\nyear produced new scenes of delight, and new competitors for\nimprisonment.\n\nThe palace stood on an eminence, raised about thirty paces above the\nsurface of the lake.  It was divided into many squares or courts, built\nwith greater or less magnificence according to the rank of those for whom\nthey were designed.  The roofs were turned into arches of massive stone,\njoined by a cement that grew harder by time, and the building stood from\ncentury to century, deriding the solstitial rains and equinoctial\nhurricanes, without need of reparation.\n\nThis house, which was so large as to be fully known to none but some\nancient officers, who successively inherited the secrets of the place,\nwas built as if Suspicion herself had dictated the plan.  To every room\nthere was an open and secret passage; every square had a communication\nwith the rest, either from the upper storeys by private galleries, or by\nsubterraneous passages from the lower apartments.  Many of the columns\nhad unsuspected cavities, in which a long race of monarchs had deposited\ntheir treasures.  They then closed up the opening with marble, which was\nnever to be removed but in the utmost exigences of the kingdom, and\nrecorded their accumulations in a book, which was itself concealed in a\ntower, not entered but by the Emperor, attended by the prince who stood\nnext in succession.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\nTHE DISCONTENT OF RASSELAS IN THE HAPPY VALLEY.\n\n\nHERE the sons and daughters of Abyssinia lived only to know the soft\nvicissitudes of pleasure and repose, attended by all that were skilful to\ndelight, and gratified with whatever the senses can enjoy.  They wandered\nin gardens of fragrance, and slept in the fortresses of security.  Every\nart was practised to make them pleased with their own condition.  The\nsages who instructed them told them of nothing but the miseries of public\nlife, and described all beyond the mountains as regions of calamity,\nwhere discord was always racing, and where man preyed upon man.  To\nheighten their opinion of their own felicity, they were daily entertained\nwith songs, the subject of which was the Happy Valley.  Their appetites\nwere excited by frequent enumerations of different enjoyments, and\nrevelry and merriment were the business of every hour, from the dawn of\nmorning to the close of the evening.\n\nThese methods were generally successful; few of the princes had ever\nwished to enlarge their bounds, but passed their lives in full conviction\nthat they had all within their reach that art or nature could bestow, and\npitied those whom nature had excluded from this seat of tranquillity as\nthe sport of chance and the slaves of misery.\n\nThus they rose in the morning and lay down at night, pleased with each\nother and with themselves, all but Rasselas, who, in the twenty-sixth\nyear of his age, began to withdraw himself from the pastimes and\nassemblies, and to delight in solitary walks and silent meditation.  He\noften sat before tables covered with luxury, and forgot to taste the\ndainties that were placed before him; he rose abruptly in the midst of\nthe song, and hastily retired beyond the sound of music.  His attendants\nobserved the change, and endeavoured to renew his love of pleasure.  He\nneglected their officiousness, repulsed their invitations, and spent day\nafter day on the banks of rivulets sheltered with trees, where he\nsometimes listened to the birds in the branches, sometimes observed the\nfish playing in the streams, and anon cast his eyes upon the pastures and\nmountains filled with animals, of which some were biting the herbage, and\nsome sleeping among the bushes.  The singularity of his humour made him\nmuch observed.  One of the sages, in whose conversation he had formerly\ndelighted, followed him secretly, in hope of discovering the cause of his\ndisquiet.  Rasselas, who knew not that any one was near him, having for\nsome time fixed his eyes upon the goats that were browsing among the\nrocks, began to compare their condition with his own.\n\n\u201cWhat,\u201d said he, \u201cmakes the difference between man and all the rest of\nthe animal creation?  Every beast that strays beside me has the same\ncorporal necessities with myself: he is hungry, and crops the grass; he\nis thirsty, and drinks the stream; his thirst and hunger are appeased; he\nis satisfied, and sleeps; he rises again, and is hungry; he is again fed,\nand is at rest.  I am hungry and thirsty, like him, but when thirst and\nhunger cease, I am not at rest.  I am, like him, pained with want, but am\nnot, like him, satisfied with fulness.  The intermediate hours are\ntedious and gloomy; I long again to be hungry that I may again quicken\nthe attention.  The birds peck the berries or the corn, and fly away to\nthe groves, where they sit in seeming happiness on the branches, and\nwaste their lives in tuning one unvaried series of sounds.  I likewise\ncan call the lutist and the singer; but the sounds that pleased me\nyesterday weary me to-day, and will grow yet more wearisome to-morrow.  I\ncan discover in me no power of perception which is not glutted with its\nproper pleasure, yet I do not feel myself delighted.  Man surely has some\nlatent sense for which this place affords no gratification; or he has\nsome desire distinct from sense, which must be satisfied before he can be\nhappy.\u201d\n\nAfter this he lifted up his head, and seeing the moon rising, walked\ntowards the palace.  As he passed through the fields, and saw the animals\naround him, \u201cYe,\u201d said he, \u201care happy, and need not envy me that walk\nthus among you, burdened with myself; nor do I, ye gentle beings, envy\nyour felicity; for it is not the felicity of man.  I have many distresses\nfrom which you are free; I fear pain when I do not feel it; I sometimes\nshrink at evils recollected, and sometimes start at evils anticipated:\nsurely the equity of Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with\npeculiar enjoyments.\u201d\n\nWith observations like these the Prince amused himself as he returned,\nuttering them with a plaintive voice, yet with a look that discovered him\nto feel some complacence in his own perspicacity, and to receive some\nsolace of the miseries of life from consciousness of the delicacy with\nwhich he felt and the eloquence with which he bewailed them.  He mingled\ncheerfully in the diversions of the evening, and all rejoiced to find\nthat his heart was lightened.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\nTHE WANTS OF HIM THAT WANTS NOTHING.\n\n\nON the next day, his old instructor, imagining that he had now made\nhimself acquainted with his disease of mind, was in hope of curing it by\ncounsel, and officiously sought an opportunity of conference, which the\nPrince, having long considered him as one whose intellects were\nexhausted, was not very willing to afford.  \u201cWhy,\u201d said he, \u201cdoes this\nman thus intrude upon me?  Shall I never be suffered to forget these\nlectures, which pleased only while they were new, and to become new again\nmust be forgotten?\u201d  He then walked into the wood, and composed himself\nto his usual meditations; when, before his thoughts had taken any settled\nform, he perceived his pursuer at his side, and was at first prompted by\nhis impatience to go hastily away; but being unwilling to offend a man\nwhom he had once reverenced and still loved, he invited him to sit down\nwith him on the bank.\n\nThe old man, thus encouraged, began to lament the change which had been\nlately observed in the Prince, and to inquire why he so often retired\nfrom the pleasures of the palace to loneliness and silence.  \u201cI fly from\npleasure,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cbecause pleasure has ceased to please: I am\nlonely because I am miserable, and am unwilling to cloud with my presence\nthe happiness of others.\u201d  \u201cYou, sir,\u201d said the sage, \u201care the first who\nhas complained of misery in the Happy Valley.  I hope to convince you\nthat your complaints have no real cause.  You are here in full possession\nof all the Emperor of Abyssinia can bestow; here is neither labour to be\nendured nor danger to be dreaded, yet here is all that labour or danger\ncan procure or purchase.  Look round and tell me which of your wants is\nwithout supply: if you want nothing, how are you unhappy?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat I want nothing,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cor that I know not what I want,\nis the cause of my complaint: if I had any known want, I should have a\ncertain wish; that wish would excite endeavour, and I should not then\nrepine to see the sun move so slowly towards the western mountains, or to\nlament when the day breaks, and sleep will no longer hide me from myself.\nWhen I see the kids and the lambs chasing one another, I fancy that I\nshould be happy if I had something to pursue.  But, possessing all that I\ncan want, I find one day and one hour exactly like another, except that\nthe latter is still more tedious than the former.  Let your experience\ninform me how the day may now seem as short as in my childhood, while\nnature was yet fresh, and every moment showed me what I never had\nobserved before.  I have already enjoyed too much: give me something to\ndesire.\u201d  The old man was surprised at this new species of affliction,\nand knew not what to reply, yet was unwilling to be silent.  \u201cSir,\u201d said\nhe, \u201cif you had seen the miseries of the world, you would know how to\nvalue your present state.\u201d  \u201cNow,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cyou have given me\nsomething to desire.  I shall long to see the miseries of the world,\nsince the sight of them is necessary to happiness.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\nTHE PRINCE CONTINUES TO GRIEVE AND MUSE.\n\n\nAT this time the sound of music proclaimed the hour of repast, and the\nconversation was concluded.  The old man went away sufficiently\ndiscontented to find that his reasonings had produced the only conclusion\nwhich they were intended to prevent.  But in the decline of life, shame\nand grief are of short duration: whether it be that we bear easily what\nwe have borne long; or that, finding ourselves in age less regarded, we\nless regard others; or that we look with slight regard upon afflictions\nto which we know that the hand of death is about to put an end.\n\nThe Prince, whose views were extended to a wider space, could not\nspeedily quiet his emotions.  He had been before terrified at the length\nof life which nature promised him, because he considered that in a long\ntime much must be endured: he now rejoiced in his youth, because in many\nyears much might be done.  The first beam of hope that had been ever\ndarted into his mind rekindled youth in his cheeks, and doubled the\nlustre of his eyes.  He was fired with the desire of doing something,\nthough he knew not yet, with distinctness, either end or means.  He was\nnow no longer gloomy and unsocial; but considering himself as master of a\nsecret stock of happiness, which he could only enjoy by concealing it, he\naffected to be busy in all the schemes of diversion, and endeavoured to\nmake others pleased with the state of which he himself was weary.  But\npleasures can never be so multiplied or continued as not to leave much of\nlife unemployed; there were many hours, both of the night and day, which\nhe could spend without suspicion in solitary thought.  The load of life\nwas much lightened; he went eagerly into the assemblies, because he\nsupposed the frequency of his presence necessary to the success of his\npurposes; he retired gladly to privacy, because he had now a subject of\nthought.  His chief amusement was to picture to himself that world which\nhe had never seen, to place himself in various conditions, to be\nentangled in imaginary difficulties, and to be engaged in wild\nadventures; but, his benevolence always terminated his projects in the\nrelief of distress, the detection of fraud, the defeat of oppression, and\nthe diffusion of happiness.\n\nThus passed twenty months of the life of Rasselas.  He busied himself so\nintensely in visionary bustle that he forgot his real solitude; and\namidst hourly preparations for the various incidents of human affairs,\nneglected to consider by what means he should mingle with mankind.\n\nOne day, as he was sitting on a bank, he feigned to himself an orphan\nvirgin robbed of her little portion by a treacherous lover, and crying\nafter him for restitution.  So strongly was the image impressed upon his\nmind that he started up in the maid\u2019s defence, and ran forward to seize\nthe plunderer with all the eagerness of real pursuit.  Fear naturally\nquickens the flight of guilt.  Rasselas could not catch the fugitive with\nhis utmost efforts; but, resolving to weary by perseverance him whom he\ncould not surpass in speed, he pressed on till the foot of the mountain\nstopped his course.\n\nHere he recollected himself, and smiled at his own useless impetuosity.\nThen raising his eyes to the mountain, \u201cThis,\u201d said he, \u201cis the fatal\nobstacle that hinders at once the enjoyment of pleasure and the exercise\nof virtue.  How long is it that my hopes and wishes have flown beyond\nthis boundary of my life, which yet I never have attempted to surmount?\u201d\n\nStruck with this reflection, he sat down to muse, and remembered that\nsince he first resolved to escape from his confinement, the sun had\npassed twice over him in his annual course.  He now felt a degree of\nregret with which he had never been before acquainted.  He considered how\nmuch might have been done in the time which had passed, and left nothing\nreal behind it.  He compared twenty months with the life of man.  \u201cIn\nlife,\u201d said he, \u201cis not to be counted the ignorance of infancy or\nimbecility of age.  We are long before we are able to think, and we soon\ncease from the power of acting.  The true period of human existence may\nbe reasonably estimated at forty years, of which I have mused away the\nfour-and-twentieth part.  What I have lost was certain, for I have\ncertainly possessed it; but of twenty months to come, who can assure me?\u201d\n\nThe consciousness of his own folly pierced him deeply, and he was long\nbefore he could be reconciled to himself.  \u201cThe rest of my time,\u201d said\nhe, \u201chas been lost by the crime or folly of my ancestors, and the absurd\ninstitutions of my country; I remember it with disgust, yet without\nremorse: but the months that have passed since new light darted into my\nsoul, since I formed a scheme of reasonable felicity, have been\nsquandered by my own fault.  I have lost that which can never be\nrestored; I have seen the sun rise and set for twenty months, an idle\ngazer on the light of heaven; in this time the birds have left the nest\nof their mother, and committed themselves to the woods and to the skies;\nthe kid has forsaken the teat, and learned by degrees to climb the rocks\nin quest of independent sustenance.  I only have made no advances, but am\nstill helpless and ignorant.  The moon, by more than twenty changes,\nadmonished me of the flux of life; the stream that rolled before my feet\nupbraided my inactivity.  I sat feasting on intellectual luxury,\nregardless alike of the examples of the earth and the instructions of the\nplanets.  Twenty months are passed: who shall restore them?\u201d\n\nThese sorrowful meditations fastened upon his mind; he passed four months\nin resolving to lose no more time in idle resolves, and was awakened to\nmore vigorous exertion by hearing a maid, who had broken a porcelain cup,\nremark that what cannot be repaired is not to be regretted.\n\nThis was obvious; and Rasselas reproached himself that he had not\ndiscovered it\u2014having not known, or not considered, how many useful hints\nare obtained by chance, and how often the mind, hurried by her own ardour\nto distant views, neglects the truths that lie open before her.  He for a\nfew hours regretted his regret, and from that time bent his whole mind\nupon the means of escaping from the Valley of Happiness.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\nTHE PRINCE MEDITATES HIS ESCAPE.\n\n\nHE now found that it would be very difficult to effect that which it was\nvery easy to suppose effected.  When he looked round about him, he saw\nhimself confined by the bars of nature, which had never yet been broken,\nand by the gate through which none that had once passed it were ever able\nto return.  He was now impatient as an eagle in a grate.  He passed week\nafter week in clambering the mountains to see if there was any aperture\nwhich the bushes might conceal, but found all the summits inaccessible by\ntheir prominence.  The iron gate he despaired to open for it was not only\nsecured with all the power of art, but was always watched by successive\nsentinels, and was, by its position, exposed to the perpetual observation\nof all the inhabitants.\n\nHe then examined the cavern through which the waters of the lake were\ndischarged; and, looking down at a time when the sun shone strongly upon\nits mouth, he discovered it to be full of broken rocks, which, though\nthey permitted the stream to flow through many narrow passages, would\nstop any body of solid bulk.  He returned discouraged and dejected; but\nhaving now known the blessing of hope, resolved never to despair.\n\nIn these fruitless researches he spent ten months.  The time, however,\npassed cheerfully away\u2014in the morning he rose with new hope; in the\nevening applauded his own diligence; and in the night slept soundly after\nhis fatigue.  He met a thousand amusements, which beguiled his labour and\ndiversified his thoughts.  He discerned the various instincts of animals\nand properties of plants, and found the place replete with wonders, of\nwhich he proposed to solace himself with the contemplation if he should\nnever be able to accomplish his flight\u2014rejoicing that his endeavours,\nthough yet unsuccessful, had supplied him with a source of inexhaustible\ninquiry.  But his original curiosity was not yet abated; he resolved to\nobtain some knowledge of the ways of men.  His wish still continued, but\nhis hope grew less.  He ceased to survey any longer the walls of his\nprison, and spared to search by new toils for interstices which he knew\ncould not be found, yet determined to keep his design always in view, and\nlay hold on any expedient that time should offer.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\nA DISSERTATION ON THE ART OF FLYING.\n\n\nAMONG the artists that had been allured into the Happy Valley, to labour\nfor the accommodation and pleasure of its inhabitants, was a man eminent\nfor his knowledge of the mechanic powers, who had contrived many engines\nboth of use and recreation.  By a wheel which the stream turned he forced\nthe water into a tower, whence it was distributed to all the apartments\nof the palace.  He erected a pavilion in the garden, around which he kept\nthe air always cool by artificial showers.  One of the groves,\nappropriated to the ladies, was ventilated by fans, to which the rivulets\nthat ran through it gave a constant motion; and instruments of soft music\nwere played at proper distances, of which some played by the impulse of\nthe wind, and some by the power of the stream.\n\nThis artist was sometimes visited by Rasselas who was pleased with every\nkind of knowledge, imagining that the time would come when all his\nacquisitions should be of use to him in the open world.  He came one day\nto amuse himself in his usual manner, and found the master busy in\nbuilding a sailing chariot.  He saw that the design was practicable upon\na level surface, and with expressions of great esteem solicited its\ncompletion.  The workman was pleased to find himself so much regarded by\nthe Prince, and resolved to gain yet higher honours.  \u201cSir,\u201d said he,\n\u201cyou have seen but a small part of what the mechanic sciences can\nperform.  I have been long of opinion that, instead of the tardy\nconveyance of ships and chariots, man might use the swifter migration of\nwings, that the fields of air are open to knowledge, and that only\nignorance and idleness need crawl upon the ground.\u201d\n\nThis hint rekindled the Prince\u2019s desire of passing the mountains.  Having\nseen what the mechanist had already performed, he was willing to fancy\nthat he could do more, yet resolved to inquire further before he suffered\nhope to afflict him by disappointment.  \u201cI am afraid,\u201d said he to the\nartist, \u201cthat your imagination prevails over your skill, and that you now\ntell me rather what you wish than what you know.  Every animal has his\nelement assigned him; the birds have the air, and man and beasts the\nearth.\u201d  \u201cSo,\u201d replied the mechanist, \u201cfishes have the water, in which\nyet beasts can swim by nature and man by art.  He that can swim needs not\ndespair to fly; to swim is to fly in a grosser fluid, and to fly is to\nswim in a subtler.  We are only to proportion our power of resistance to\nthe different density of matter through which we are to pass.  You will\nbe necessarily up-borne by the air if you can renew any impulse upon it\nfaster than the air can recede from the pressure.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut the exercise of swimming,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cis very laborious; the\nstrongest limbs are soon wearied.  I am afraid the act of flying will be\nyet more violent; and wings will be of no great use unless we can fly\nfurther than we can swim.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe labour of rising from the ground,\u201d said the artist, \u201cwill be great,\nas we see it in the heavier domestic fowls; but as we mount higher the\nearth\u2019s attraction and the body\u2019s gravity will be gradually diminished,\ntill we shall arrive at a region where the man shall float in the air\nwithout any tendency to fall; no care will then be necessary but to move\nforward, which the gentlest impulse will effect.  You, sir, whose\ncuriosity is so extensive, will easily conceive with what pleasure a\nphilosopher, furnished with wings and hovering in the sky, would see the\nearth and all its inhabitants rolling beneath him, and presenting to him\nsuccessively, by its diurnal motion, all the countries within the same\nparallel.  How must it amuse the pendent spectator to see the moving\nscene of land and ocean, cities and deserts; to survey with equal\nsecurity the marts of trade and the fields of battle; mountains infested\nby barbarians, and fruitful regions gladdened by plenty and lulled by\npeace.  How easily shall we then trace the Nile through all his passages,\npass over to distant regions, and examine the face of nature from one\nextremity of the earth to the other.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll this,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cis much to be desired, but I am afraid that\nno man will be able to breathe in these regions of speculation and\ntranquillity.  I have been told that respiration is difficult upon lofty\nmountains, yet from these precipices, though so high as to produce great\ntenuity of air, it is very easy to fall; therefore I suspect that from\nany height where life can be supported, there may be danger of too quick\ndescent.\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing,\u201d replied the artist, \u201cwill ever be attempted if all possible\nobjections must be first overcome.  If you will favour my project, I will\ntry the first flight at my own hazard.  I have considered the structure\nof all volant animals, and find the folding continuity of the bat\u2019s wings\nmost easily accommodated to the human form.  Upon this model I shall\nbegin my task to-morrow, and in a year expect to tower into the air\nbeyond the malice and pursuit of man.  But I will work only on this\ncondition, that the art shall not be divulged, and that you shall not\nrequire me to make wings for any but ourselves.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cshould you envy others so great an advantage?  All\nskill ought to be exerted for universal good; every man has owed much to\nothers, and ought to repay the kindness that he has received.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf men were all virtuous,\u201d returned the artist, \u201cI should with great\nalacrity teach them to fly.  But what would be the security of the good\nif the bad could at pleasure invade them from the sky?  Against an army\nsailing through the clouds neither walls, mountains, nor seas could\nafford security.  A flight of northern savages might hover in the wind\nand light with irresistible violence upon the capital of a fruitful\nreason.  Even this valley, the retreat of princes, the abode of\nhappiness, might be violated by the sudden descent of some of the naked\nnations that swarm on the coast of the southern sea!\u201d\n\nThe Prince promised secrecy, and waited for the performance, not wholly\nhopeless of success.  He visited the work from time to time, observed its\nprogress, and remarked many ingenious contrivances to facilitate motion\nand unite levity with strength.  The artist was every day more certain\nthat he should leave vultures and eagles behind him, and the contagion of\nhis confidence seized upon the Prince.  In a year the wings were\nfinished; and on a morning appointed the maker appeared, furnished for\nflight, on a little promontory; he waved his pinions awhile to gather\nair, then leaped from his stand, and in an instant dropped into the lake.\nHis wings, which were of no use in the air, sustained him in the water;\nand the Prince drew him to land half dead with terror and vexation.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\nTHE PRINCE FINDS A MAN OF LEARNING.\n\n\nTHE Prince was not much afflicted by this disaster, having suffered\nhimself to hope for a happier event only because he had no other means of\nescape in view.  He still persisted in his design to leave the Happy\nValley by the first opportunity.\n\nHis imagination was now at a stand; he had no prospect of entering into\nthe world, and, notwithstanding all his endeavours to support himself,\ndiscontent by degrees preyed upon him, and he began again to lose his\nthoughts in sadness when the rainy season, which in these countries is\nperiodical, made it inconvenient to wander in the woods.\n\nThe rain continued longer and with more violence than had ever been\nknown; the clouds broke on the surrounding mountains, and the torrents\nstreamed into the plain on every side, till the cavern was too narrow to\ndischarge the water.  The lake overflowed its banks, and all the level of\nthe valley was covered with the inundation.  The eminence on which the\npalace was built, and some other spots of rising ground, were all that\nthe eye could now discover.  The herds and flocks left the pasture, and\nboth the wild beasts and the tame retreated to the mountains.\n\nThis inundation confined all the princes to domestic amusements, and the\nattention of Rasselas was particularly seized by a poem (which Imlac\nrehearsed) upon the various conditions of humanity.  He commanded the\npoet to attend him in his apartment, and recite his verses a second time;\nthen entering into familiar talk, he thought himself happy in having\nfound a man who knew the world so well, and could so skilfully paint the\nscenes of life.  He asked a thousand questions about things to which,\nthough common to all other mortals, his confinement from childhood had\nkept him a stranger.  The poet pitied his ignorance, and loved his\ncuriosity, and entertained him from day to day with novelty and\ninstruction so that the Prince regretted the necessity of sleep, and\nlonged till the morning should renew his pleasure.\n\nAs they were sitting together, the Prince commanded Imlac to relate his\nhistory, and to tell by what accident he was forced, or by what motive\ninduced, to close his life in the Happy Valley.  As he was going to begin\nhis narrative, Rasselas was called to a concert, and obliged to restrain\nhis curiosity till the evening.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\nTHE HISTORY OF IMLAC.\n\n\nTHE close of the day is, in the regions of the torrid zone, the only\nseason of diversion and entertainment, and it was therefore midnight\nbefore the music ceased and the princesses retired.  Rasselas then called\nfor his companion, and required him to begin the story of his life.\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cmy history will not be long: the life that is devoted\nto knowledge passes silently away, and is very little diversified by\nevents.  To talk in public, to think in solitude, to read and to hear, to\ninquire and answer inquiries, is the business of a scholar.  He wanders\nabout the world without pomp or terror, and is neither known nor valued\nbut by men like himself.\n\n\u201cI was born in the kingdom of Goiama, at no great distance from the\nfountain of the Nile.  My father was a wealthy merchant, who traded\nbetween the inland countries of Africa and the ports of the Red Sea.  He\nwas honest, frugal, and diligent, but of mean sentiments and narrow\ncomprehension; he desired only to be rich, and to conceal his riches,\nlest he should be spoiled by the governors of the province.\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cmy father must be negligent of his charge if\nany man in his dominions dares take that which belongs to another.  Does\nhe not know that kings are accountable for injustice permitted as well as\ndone?  If I were Emperor, not the meanest of my subjects should be\noppressed with impunity.  My blood boils when I am told that a merchant\ndurst not enjoy his honest gains for fear of losing them by the rapacity\nof power.  Name the governor who robbed the people that I may declare his\ncrimes to the Emperor!\u201d\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cyour ardour is the natural effect of virtue animated\nby youth.  The time will come when you will acquit your father, and\nperhaps hear with less impatience of the governor.  Oppression is, in the\nAbyssinian dominions, neither frequent nor tolerated; but no form of\ngovernment has been yet discovered by which cruelty can be wholly\nprevented.  Subordination supposes power on one part and subjection on\nthe other; and if power be in the hands of men it will sometimes be\nabused.  The vigilance of the supreme magistrate may do much, but much\nwill still remain undone.  He can never know all the crimes that are\ncommitted, and can seldom punish all that he knows.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cI do not understand; but I had rather hear thee\nthan dispute.  Continue thy narration.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy father,\u201d proceeded Imlac, \u201coriginally intended that I should have no\nother education than such as might qualify me for commerce; and\ndiscovering in me great strength of memory and quickness of apprehension,\noften declared his hope that I should be some time the richest man in\nAbyssinia.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cdid thy father desire the increase of his wealth\nwhen it was already greater than he durst discover or enjoy?  I am\nunwilling to doubt thy veracity, yet inconsistencies cannot both be\ntrue.\u201d\n\n\u201cInconsistencies,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201ccannot both be right; but, imputed to\nman, they may both be true.  Yet diversity is not inconsistency.  My\nfather might expect a time of greater security.  However, some desire is\nnecessary to keep life in motion; and he whose real wants are supplied\nmust admit those of fancy.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cI can in some measure conceive.  I repent that\nI interrupted thee.\u201d\n\n\u201cWith this hope,\u201d proceeded Imlac, \u201che sent me to school.  But when I had\nonce found the delight of knowledge, and felt the pleasure of\nintelligence and the pride of invention, I began silently to despise\nriches, and determined to disappoint the purposes of my father, whose\ngrossness of conception raised my pity.  I was twenty years old before\nhis tenderness would expose me to the fatigue of travel; in which time I\nhad been instructed, by successive masters, in all the literature of my\nnative country.  As every hour taught me something new, I lived in a\ncontinual course of gratification; but as I advanced towards manhood, I\nlost much of the reverence with which I had been used to look on my\ninstructors; because when the lessons were ended I did not find them\nwiser or better than common men.\n\n\u201cAt length my father resolved to initiate me in commerce; and, opening\none of his subterranean treasuries, counted out ten thousand pieces of\ngold.  \u2018This, young man,\u2019 said he, \u2018is the stock with which you must\nnegotiate.  I began with less than a fifth part, and you see how\ndiligence and parsimony have increased it.  This is your own, to waste or\nimprove.  If you squander it by negligence or caprice, you must wait for\nmy death before you will be rich; if in four years you double your stock,\nwe will thenceforward let subordination cease, and live together as\nfriends and partners, for he shall be always equal with me who is equally\nskilled in the art of growing rich.\u2019\n\n\u201cWe laid out our money upon camels, concealed in bales of cheap goods,\nand travelled to the shore of the Red Sea.  When I cast my eye on the\nexpanse of waters, my heart bounded like that of a prisoner escaped.  I\nfelt an inextinguishable curiosity kindle in my mind, and resolved to\nsnatch this opportunity of seeing the manners of other nations, and of\nlearning sciences unknown in Abyssinia.\n\n\u201cI remembered that my father had obliged me to the improvement of my\nstock, not by a promise, which I ought not to violate, but by a penalty,\nwhich I was at liberty to incur; and therefore determined to gratify my\npredominant desire, and, by drinking at the fountain of knowledge, to\nquench the thirst of curiosity.\n\n\u201cAs I was supposed to trade without connection with my father, it was\neasy for me to become acquainted with the master of a ship, and procure a\npassage to some other country.  I had no motives of choice to regulate my\nvoyage.  It was sufficient for me that, wherever I wandered, I should see\na country which I had not seen before.  I therefore entered a ship bound\nfor Surat, having left a letter for my father declaring my intention.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\nTHE HISTORY OF IMLAC (_continued_).\n\n\n\u201cWHEN I first entered upon the world of waters, and lost sight of land, I\nlooked round about me in pleasing terror, and thinking my soul enlarged\nby the boundless prospect, imagined that I could gaze around me for ever\nwithout satiety; but in a short time I grew weary of looking on barren\nuniformity, where I could only see again what I had already seen.  I then\ndescended into the ship, and doubted for awhile whether all my future\npleasures would not end, like this, in disgust and disappointment.  \u2018Yet\nsurely,\u2019 said I, \u2018the ocean and the land are very different.  The only\nvariety of water is rest and motion.  But the earth has mountains and\nvalleys, deserts and cities; it is inhabited by men of different customs\nand contrary opinions; and I may hope to find variety in life, though I\nshould miss it in nature.\u2019\n\n\u201cWith this thought I quieted my mind, and amused myself during the\nvoyage, sometimes by learning from the sailors the art of navigation,\nwhich I have never practised, and sometimes by forming schemes for my\nconduct in different situations, in not one of which I have been ever\nplaced.\n\n\u201cI was almost weary of my naval amusements when we safely landed at\nSurat.  I secured my money and, purchasing some commodities for show,\njoined myself to a caravan that was passing into the inland country.  My\ncompanions, for some reason or other, conjecturing that I was rich, and,\nby my inquiries and admiration, finding that I was ignorant, considered\nme as a novice whom they had a right to cheat, and who was to learn, at\nthe usual expense, the art of fraud.  They exposed me to the theft of\nservants and the exaction of officers, and saw me plundered upon false\npretences, without any advantage to themselves but that of rejoicing in\nthe superiority of their own knowledge.\u201d\n\n\u201cStop a moment,\u201d said the Prince; \u201cis there such depravity in man as that\nhe should injure another without benefit to himself?  I can easily\nconceive that all are pleased with superiority; but your ignorance was\nmerely accidental, which, being neither your crime nor your folly, could\nafford them no reason to applaud themselves; and the knowledge which they\nhad, and which you wanted, they might as effectually have shown by\nwarning as betraying you.\u201d\n\n\u201cPride,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis seldom delicate; it will please itself with very\nmean advantages, and envy feels not its own happiness but when it may be\ncompared with the misery of others.  They were my enemies because they\ngrieved to think me rich, and my oppressors because they delighted to\nfind me weak.\u201d\n\n\u201cProceed,\u201d said the Prince; \u201cI doubt not of the facts which you relate,\nbut imagine that you impute them to mistaken motives.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn this company,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cI arrived at Agra, the capital of\nHindostan, the city in which the Great Mogul commonly resides.  I applied\nmyself to the language of the country, and in a few months was able to\nconverse with the learned men; some of whom I found morose and reserved,\nand others easy and communicative; some were unwilling to teach another\nwhat they had with difficulty learned themselves; and some showed that\nthe end of their studies was to gain the dignity of instructing.\n\n\u201cTo the tutor of the young princes I recommended myself so much that I\nwas presented to the Emperor as a man of uncommon knowledge.  The Emperor\nasked me many questions concerning my country and my travels, and though\nI cannot now recollect anything that he uttered above the power of a\ncommon man, he dismissed me astonished at his wisdom and enamoured of his\ngoodness.\n\n\u201cMy credit was now so high that the merchants with whom I had travelled\napplied to me for recommendations to the ladies of the Court.  I was\nsurprised at their confidence of solicitation and greatly reproached them\nwith their practices on the road.  They heard me with cold indifference,\nand showed no tokens of shame or sorrow.\n\n\u201cThey then urged their request with the offer of a bribe, but what I\nwould not do for kindness I would not do for money, and refused them, not\nbecause they had injured me, but because I would not enable them to\ninjure others; for I knew they would have made use of my credit to cheat\nthose who should buy their wares.\n\n\u201cHaving resided at Agra till there was no more to be learned, I travelled\ninto Persia, where I saw many remains of ancient magnificence and\nobserved many new accommodations of life.  The Persians are a nation\neminently social, and their assemblies afforded me daily opportunities of\nremarking characters and manners, and of tracing human nature through all\nits variations.\n\n\u201cFrom Persia I passed into Arabia, where I saw a nation pastoral and\nwarlike, who lived without any settled habitation, whose wealth is their\nflocks and herds, and who have carried on through ages an hereditary war\nwith mankind, though they neither covet nor envy their possessions.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\nIMLAC\u2019S HISTORY (_continued_)\u2014A DISSERTATION UPON POETRY.\n\n\n\u201cWHEREVER I went I found that poetry was considered as the highest\nlearning, and regarded with a veneration somewhat approaching to that\nwhich man would pay to angelic nature.  And yet it fills me with wonder\nthat in almost all countries the most ancient poets are considered as the\nbest; whether it be that every other kind of knowledge is an acquisition\ngreatly attained, and poetry is a gift conferred at once; or that the\nfirst poetry of every nation surprised them as a novelty, and retained\nthe credit by consent which it received by accident at first; or whether,\nas the province of poetry is to describe nature and passion, which are\nalways the same, the first writers took possession of the most striking\nobjects for description and the most probable occurrences for fiction,\nand left nothing to those that followed them but transcription of the\nsame events and new combinations of the same images.  Whatever be the\nreason, it is commonly observed that the early writers are in possession\nof nature, and their followers of art; that the first excel in strength\nand invention, and the latter in elegance and refinement.\n\n\u201cI was desirous to add my name to this illustrious fraternity.  I read\nall the poets of Persia and Arabia, and was able to repeat by memory the\nvolumes that are suspended in the mosque of Mecca.  But I soon found that\nno man was ever great by imitations.  My desire of excellence impelled me\nto transfer my attention to nature and to life.  Nature was to be my\nsubject, and men to be my auditors.  I could never describe what I had\nnot seen.  I could not hope to move those with delight or terror whose\ninterests and opinions I did not understand.\n\n\u201cBeing now resolved to be a poet, I saw everything with a new purpose; my\nsphere of attention was suddenly magnified; no kind of knowledge was to\nbe overlooked.  I ranged mountains and deserts for images and\nresemblances, and pictured upon my mind every tree of the forest and\nflower of the valley.  I observed with equal care the crags of the rock\nand the pinnacles of the palace.  Sometimes I wandered along the mazes of\nthe rivulet, and sometimes watched the changes of the summer clouds.  To\na poet nothing can be useless.  Whatever is beautiful and whatever is\ndreadful must be familiar to his imagination; he must be conversant with\nall that is awfully vast or elegantly little.  The plants of the garden,\nthe animals of the wood, the minerals of the earth, and meteors of the\nsky, must all concur to store his mind with inexhaustible variety; for\nevery idea is useful for the enforcement or decoration of moral or\nreligious truth, and he who knows most will have most power of\ndiversifying his scenes and of gratifying his reader with remote\nallusions and unexpected instruction.\n\n\u201cAll the appearances of nature I was therefore careful to study, and\nevery country which I have surveyed has contributed something to my\npoetical powers.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn so wide a survey,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cyou must surely have left much\nunobserved.  I have lived till now within the circuit of the mountains,\nand yet cannot walk abroad without the sight of something which I had\nnever beheld before, or never heeded.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis business of a poet,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis to examine, not the\nindividual, but the species; to remark general properties and large\nappearances.  He does not number the streaks of the tulip, or describe\nthe different shades of the verdure of the forest.  He is to exhibit in\nhis portraits of nature such prominent and striking features as recall\nthe original to every mind, and must neglect the minuter discriminations,\nwhich one may have remarked and another have neglected, for those\ncharacteristics which are alike obvious to vigilance and carelessness.\n\n\u201cBut the knowledge of nature is only half the task of a poet; he must be\nacquainted likewise with all the modes of life.  His character requires\nthat he estimate the happiness and misery of every condition, observe the\npower of all the passions in all their combinations, and trace the\nchanges of the human mind, as they are modified by various institutions\nand accidental influences of climate or custom, from the sprightliness of\ninfancy to the despondence of decrepitude.  He must divest himself of the\nprejudices of his age and country; he must consider right and wrong in\ntheir abstracted and invariable state; he must disregard present laws and\nopinions, and rise to general and transcendental truths, which will\nalways be the same.  He must, therefore, content himself with the slow\nprogress of his name, contemn the praise of his own time, and commit his\nclaims to the justice of posterity.  He must write as the interpreter of\nnature and the legislator of mankind, and consider himself as presiding\nover the thoughts and manners of future generations, as a being superior\nto time and place.\n\n\u201cHis labour is not yet at an end.  He must know many languages and many\nsciences, and, that his style may be worthy of his thoughts, must by\nincessant practice familiarise to himself every delicacy of speech and\ngrace of harmony.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\nIMLAC\u2019S NARRATIVE (_continued_)\u2014A HINT OF PILGRIMAGE.\n\n\nIMLAC now felt the enthusiastic fit, and was proceeding to aggrandise his\nown profession, when then Prince cried out: \u201cEnough! thou hast convinced\nme that no human being can ever be a poet.  Proceed with thy narration.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo be a poet,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis indeed very difficult.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo difficult,\u201d returned the Prince, \u201cthat I will at present hear no more\nof his labours.  Tell me whither you went when you had seen Persia.\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom Persia,\u201d said the poet, \u201cI travelled through Syria, and for three\nyears resided in Palestine, where I conversed with great numbers of the\nnorthern and western nations of Europe, the nations which are now in\npossession of all power and all knowledge, whose armies are irresistible,\nand whose fleets command the remotest parts of the globe.  When I\ncompared these men with the natives of our own kingdom and those that\nsurround us, they appeared almost another order of beings.  In their\ncountries it is difficult to wish for anything that may not be obtained;\na thousand arts, of which we never heard, are continually labouring for\ntheir convenience and pleasure, and whatever their own climate has denied\nthem is supplied by their commerce.\u201d\n\n\u201cBy what means,\u201d said the Prince, \u201care the Europeans thus powerful? or\nwhy, since they can so easily visit Asia and Africa for trade or\nconquest, cannot the Asiatics and Africans invade their coast, plant\ncolonies in their ports, and give laws to their natural princes?  The\nsame wind that carries them back would bring us thither.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are more powerful, sir, than we,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201cbecause they are\nwiser; knowledge will always predominate over ignorance, as man governs\nthe other animals.  But why their knowledge is more than ours I know not\nwhat reason can be given but the unsearchable will of the Supreme Being.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen,\u201d said the Prince with a sigh, \u201cshall I be able to visit Palestine,\nand mingle with this mighty confluence of nations?  Till that happy\nmoment shall arrive, let me fill up the time with such representations as\nthou canst give me.  I am not ignorant of the motive that assembles such\nnumbers in that place, and cannot but consider it as the centre of wisdom\nand piety, to which the best and wisest men of every land must be\ncontinually resorting.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere are some nations,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cthat send few visitants to\nPalestine; for many numerous and learned sects in Europe concur to\ncensure pilgrimage as superstitious, or deride it as ridiculous.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou know,\u201d said the Prince, \u201chow little my life has made me acquainted\nwith diversity of opinions; it will be too long to hear the arguments on\nboth sides; you, that have considered them, tell me the result.\u201d\n\n\u201cPilgrimage,\u201d said Imlac, \u201clike many other acts of piety, may be\nreasonable or superstitious, according to the principles upon which it is\nperformed.  Long journeys in search of truth are not commanded.  Truth,\nsuch as is necessary to the regulation of life, is always found where it\nis honestly sought.  Change of place is no natural cause of the increase\nof piety, for it inevitably produces dissipation of mind.  Yet, since men\ngo every day to view the fields where great actions have been performed,\nand return with stronger impressions of the event, curiosity of the same\nkind may naturally dispose us to view that country whence our religion\nhad its beginning, and I believe no man surveys those awful scenes\nwithout some confirmation of holy resolutions.  That the Supreme Being\nmay be more easily propitiated in one place than in another is the dream\nof idle superstition, but that some places may operate upon our own minds\nin an uncommon manner is an opinion which hourly experience will justify.\nHe who supposes that his vices may be more successfully combated in\nPalestine, will perhaps find himself mistaken; yet he may go thither\nwithout folly; he who thinks they will be more freely pardoned,\ndishonours at once his reason and religion.\u201d\n\n\u201cThese,\u201d said the Prince, \u201care European distinctions.  I will consider\nthem another time.  What have you found to be the effect of knowledge?\nAre those nations happier than we?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is so much infelicity,\u201d said the poet, \u201cin the world, that scarce\nany man has leisure from his own distresses to estimate the comparative\nhappiness of others.  Knowledge is certainly one of the means of\npleasure, as is confessed by the natural desire which every mind feels of\nincreasing its ideas.  Ignorance is mere privation, by which nothing can\nbe produced; it is a vacuity in which the soul sits motionless and torpid\nfor want of attraction, and, without knowing why, we always rejoice when\nwe learn, and grieve when we forget.  I am therefore inclined to conclude\nthat if nothing counteracts the natural consequence of learning, we grow\nmore happy as out minds take a wider range.\n\n\u201cIn enumerating the particular comforts of life, we shall find many\nadvantages on the side of the Europeans.  They cure wounds and diseases\nwith which we languish and perish.  We suffer inclemencies of weather\nwhich they can obviate.  They have engines for the despatch of many\nlaborious works, which we must perform by manual industry.  There is such\ncommunication between distant places that one friend can hardly be said\nto be absent from another.  Their policy removes all public\ninconveniences; they have roads cut through the mountains, and bridges\nlaid over their rivers.  And, if we descend to the privacies of life,\ntheir habitations are more commodious and their possessions are more\nsecure.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are surely happy,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cwho have all these\nconveniences, of which I envy none so much as the facility with which\nseparated friends interchange their thoughts.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe Europeans,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201care less unhappy than we, but they are\nnot happy.  Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be\nendured and little to be enjoyed.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\nTHE STORY OF IMLAC (_continued_).\n\n\n\u201cI AM not willing,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cto suppose that happiness is so\nparsimoniously distributed to mortals, nor can I believe but that, if I\nhad the choice of life, I should be able to fill every day with pleasure.\nI would injure no man, and should provoke no resentments; I would relieve\nevery distress, and should enjoy the benedictions of gratitude.  I would\nchoose my friends among the wise and my wife among the virtuous, and\ntherefore should be in no danger from treachery or unkindness.  My\nchildren should by my care be learned and pious, and would repay to my\nage what their childhood had received.  What would dare to molest him who\nmight call on every side to thousands enriched by his bounty or assisted\nby his power?  And why should not life glide away in the soft\nreciprocation of protection and reverence?  All this may be done without\nthe help of European refinements, which appear by their effects to be\nrather specious than useful.  Let us leave them and pursue our journey.\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom Palestine,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cI passed through many regions of Asia; in\nthe more civilised kingdoms as a trader, and among the barbarians of the\nmountains as a pilgrim.  At last I began to long for my native country,\nthat I might repose after my travels and fatigues in the places where I\nhad spent my earliest years, and gladden my old companions with the\nrecital of my adventures.  Often did I figure to myself those with whom I\nhad sported away the gay hours of dawning life, sitting round me in its\nevening, wondering at my tales and listening to my counsels.\n\n\u201cWhen this thought had taken possession of my mind, I considered every\nmoment as wasted which did not bring me nearer to Abyssinia.  I hastened\ninto Egypt, and, notwithstanding my impatience, was detained ten months\nin the contemplation of its ancient magnificence and in inquiries after\nthe remains of its ancient learning.  I found in Cairo a mixture of all\nnations: some brought thither by the love of knowledge, some by the hope\nof gain; many by the desire of living after their own manner without\nobservation, and of lying hid in the obscurity of multitudes; for in a\ncity populous as Cairo it is possible to obtain at the same time the\ngratifications of society and the secrecy of solitude.\n\n\u201cFrom Cairo I travelled to Suez, and embarked on the Red Sea, passing\nalong the coast till I arrived at the port from which I had departed\ntwenty years before.  Here I joined myself to a caravan, and re-entered\nmy native country.\n\n\u201cI now expected the caresses of my kinsmen and the congratulations of my\nfriends, and was not without hope that my father, whatever value he had\nset upon riches, would own with gladness and pride a son who was able to\nadd to the felicity and honour of the nation.  But I was soon convinced\nthat my thoughts were vain.  My father had been dead fourteen years,\nhaving divided his wealth among my brothers, who were removed to some\nother provinces.  Of my companions, the greater part was in the grave; of\nthe rest, some could with difficulty remember me, and some considered me\nas one corrupted by foreign manners.\n\n\u201cA man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected.  I forgot, after a\ntime, my disappointment, and endeavoured to recommend myself to the\nnobles of the kingdom; they admitted me to their tables, heard my story,\nand dismissed me.  I opened a school, and was prohibited to teach.  I\nthen resolved to sit down in the quiet of domestic life, and addressed a\nlady that was fond of my conversation, but rejected my suit because my\nfather was a merchant.\n\n\u201cWearied at last with solicitation and repulses, I resolved to hide\nmyself for ever from the world, and depend no longer on the opinion or\ncaprice of others.  I waited for the time when the gate of the Happy\nValley should open, that I might bid farewell to hope and fear; the day\ncame, my performance was distinguished with favour, and I resigned myself\nwith joy to perpetual confinement.\u201d\n\n\u201cHast thou here found happiness at last?\u201d said Rasselas.  \u201cTell me,\nwithout reserve, art thou content with thy condition, or dost thou wish\nto be again wandering and inquiring?  All the inhabitants of this valley\ncelebrate their lot, and at the annual visit of the Emperor invite others\nto partake of their felicity.\u201d\n\n\u201cGreat Prince,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cI shall speak the truth.  I know not one of\nall your attendants who does not lament the hour when he entered this\nretreat.  I am less unhappy than the rest, because I have a mind replete\nwith images, which I can vary and combine at pleasure.  I can amuse my\nsolitude by the renovation of the knowledge which begins to fade from my\nmemory, and by recollection of the accidents of my past life.  Yet all\nthis ends in the sorrowful consideration that my acquirements are now\nuseless, and that none of my pleasures can be again enjoyed.  The rest,\nwhose minds have no impression but of the present moment, are either\ncorroded by malignant passions or sit stupid in the gloom of perpetual\nvacancy.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat passions can infest those,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cwho have no rivals?\nWe are in a place where impotence precludes malice, and where all envy is\nrepressed by community of enjoyments.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere may be community,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cof material possessions, but there\ncan never be community of love or of esteem.  It must happen that one\nwill please more than another; he that knows himself despised will always\nbe envious, and still more envious and malevolent if he is condemned to\nlive in the presence of those who despise him.  The invitations by which\nthey allure others to a state which they feel to be wretched, proceed\nfrom the natural malignity of hopeless misery.  They are weary of\nthemselves and of each other, and expect to find relief in new\ncompanions.  They envy the liberty which their folly has forfeited, and\nwould gladly see all mankind imprisoned like themselves.\n\n\u201cFrom this crime, however, I am wholly free.  No man can say that he is\nwretched by my persuasion.  I look with pity on the crowds who are\nannually soliciting admission to captivity, and wish that it were lawful\nfor me to warn them of their danger.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear Imlac,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cI will open to thee my whole heart.  I\nhave long meditated an escape from the Happy Valley.  I have examined the\nmountain on every side, but find myself insuperably barred\u2014teach me the\nway to break my prison; thou shalt be the companion of my flight, the\nguide of my rambles, the partner of my fortune, and my sole director in\nthe _choice of life_.\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d answered the poet, \u201cyour escape will be difficult, and perhaps you\nmay soon repent your curiosity.  The world, which you figure to yourself\nsmooth and quiet as the lake in the valley, you will find a sea foaming\nwith tempests and boiling with whirlpools; you will be sometimes\noverwhelmed by the waves of violence, and sometimes dashed against the\nrocks of treachery.  Amidst wrongs and frauds, competitions and\nanxieties, you will wish a thousand times for these seats of quiet, and\nwillingly quit hope to be free from fear.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not seek to deter me from my purpose,\u201d said the Prince.  \u201cI am\nimpatient to see what thou hast seen; and since thou art thyself weary of\nthe valley, it is evident that thy former state was better than this.\nWhatever be the consequence of my experiment, I am resolved to judge with\nmine own eyes of the various conditions of men, and then to make\ndeliberately my _choice of life_.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am afraid,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cyou are hindered by stronger restraints than\nmy persuasions; yet, if your determination is fixed, I do not counsel you\nto despair.  Few things are impossible to diligence and skill.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\nRASSELAS DISCOVERS THE MEANS OF ESCAPE.\n\n\nTHE Prince now dismissed his favourite to rest; but the narrative of\nwonders and novelties filled his mind with perturbation.  He revolved all\nthat he had heard, and prepared innumerable questions for the morning.\n\nMuch of his uneasiness was now removed.  He had a friend to whom he could\nimpart his thoughts, and whose experience could assist him in his\ndesigns.  His heart was no longer condemned to swell with silent\nvexation.  He thought that even the Happy Valley might be endured with\nsuch a companion, and that if they could range the world together he\nshould have nothing further to desire.\n\nIn a few days the water was discharged, and the ground dried.  The Prince\nand Imlac then walked out together, to converse without the notice of the\nrest.  The Prince, whose thoughts were always on the wing, as he passed\nby the gate said, with a countenance of sorrow, \u201cWhy art thou so strong,\nand why is man so weak?\u201d\n\n\u201cMan is not weak,\u201d answered his companion; \u201cknowledge is more than\nequivalent to force.  The master of mechanics laughs at strength.  I can\nburst the gate, but cannot do it secretly.  Some other expedient must be\ntried.\u201d\n\nAs they were walking on the side of the mountain they observed that the\nconeys, which the rain had driven from their burrows, had taken shelter\namong the bushes, and formed holes behind them tending upwards in an\noblique line.   \u201cIt has been the opinion of antiquity,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cthat\nhuman reason borrowed many arts from the instinct of animals; let us,\ntherefore, not think ourselves degraded by learning from the coney.  We\nmay escape by piercing the mountain in the same direction.  We will begin\nwhere the summit hangs over the middle part, and labour upward till we\nshall issue out beyond the prominence.\u201d\n\nThe eyes of the Prince, when he heard this proposal, sparkled with joy.\nThe execution was easy and the success certain.\n\nNo time was now lost.  They hastened early in the morning to choose a\nplace proper for their mine.  They clambered with great fatigue among\ncrags and brambles, and returned without having discovered any part that\nfavoured their design.  The second and the third day were spent in the\nsame manner, and with the same frustration; but on the fourth day they\nfound a small cavern concealed by a thicket, where they resolved to make\ntheir experiment.\n\nImlac procured instruments proper to hew stone and remove earth, and they\nfell to their work on the next day with more eagerness than vigour.  They\nwere presently exhausted by their efforts, and sat down to pant upon the\ngrass.  The Prince for a moment appeared to be discouraged.  \u201cSir,\u201d said\nhis companion, \u201cpractice will enable us to continue our labour for a\nlonger time.  Mark, however, how far we have advanced, and ye will find\nthat our toil will some time have an end.  Great works are performed not\nby strength, but perseverance; yonder palace was raised by single stones,\nyet you see its height and spaciousness.  He that shall walk with vigour\nthree hours a day, will pass in seven years a space equal to the\ncircumference of the globe.\u201d\n\nThey returned to their work day after day, and in a short time found a\nfissure in the rock, which enabled them to pass far with very little\nobstruction.  This Rasselas considered as a good omen.  \u201cDo not disturb\nyour mind,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cwith other hopes or fears than reason may\nsuggest; if you are pleased with the prognostics of good, you will be\nterrified likewise with tokens of evil, and your whole life will be a\nprey to superstition.  Whatever facilitates our work is more than an\nomen; it is a cause of success.  This is one of those pleasing surprises\nwhich often happen to active resolution.  Many things difficult to design\nprove easy to performance.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\nRASSELAS AND IMLAC RECEIVE AN UNEXPECTED VISIT.\n\n\nTHEY had now wrought their way to the middle, and solaced their toil with\nthe approach of liberty, when the Prince, coming down to refresh himself\nwith air, found his sister Nekayah standing at the mouth of the cavity.\nHe started, and stood confused, afraid to tell his design, and yet\nhopeless to conceal it.  A few moments determined him to repose on her\nfidelity, and secure her secrecy by a declaration without reserve.\n\n\u201cDo not imagine,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cthat I came hither as a spy.  I had\nlong observed from my window that you and Imlac directed your walk every\nday towards the same point, but I did not suppose you had any better\nreason for the preference than a cooler shade or more fragrant bank, nor\nfollowed you with any other design than to partake of your conversation.\nSince, then, not suspicion, but fondness, has detected you, let me not\nlose the advantage of my discovery.  I am equally weary of confinement\nwith yourself, and not less desirous of knowing what is done or suffered\nin the world.  Permit me to fly with you from this tasteless\ntranquillity, which will yet grow more loathsome when you have left me.\nYou may deny me to accompany you, but cannot hinder me from following.\u201d\n\nThe Prince, who loved Nekayah above his other sisters, had no inclination\nto refuse her request, and grieved that he had lost an opportunity of\nshowing his confidence by a voluntary communication.  It was, therefore,\nagreed that she should leave the valley with them; and that in the\nmeantime she should watch, lest any other straggler should, by chance or\ncuriosity, follow them to the mountain.\n\nAt length their labour was at an end.  They saw light beyond the\nprominence, and, issuing to the top of the mountain, beheld the Nile, yet\na narrow current, wandering beneath them.\n\nThe Prince looked round with rapture, anticipated all the pleasures of\ntravel, and in thought was already transported beyond his father\u2019s\ndominions.  Imlac, though very joyful at his escape, had less expectation\nof pleasure in the world, which he had before tried and of which he had\nbeen weary.\n\nRasselas was so much delighted with a wider horizon, that he could not\nsoon be persuaded to return into the valley.  He informed his sister that\nthe way was now open, and that nothing now remained but to prepare for\ntheir departure.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\nTHE PRINCE AND PRINCESS LEAVE THE VALLEY, AND SEE MANY WONDERS.\n\n\nTHE Prince and Princess had jewels sufficient to make them rich whenever\nthey came into a place of commerce, which, by Imlac\u2019s direction, they hid\nin their clothes, and on the night of the next full moon all left the\nvalley.  The Princess was followed only by a single favourite, who did\nnot know whither she was going.\n\nThey clambered through the cavity, and began to go down on the other\nside.  The Princess and her maid turned their eyes toward every part, and\nseeing nothing to bound their prospect, considered themselves in danger\nof being lost in a dreary vacuity.  They stopped and trembled.  \u201cI am\nalmost afraid,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cto begin a journey of which I cannot\nperceive an end, and to venture into this immense plain where I may be\napproached on every side by men whom I never saw.\u201d  The Prince felt\nnearly the same emotions, though he thought it more manly to conceal\nthem.\n\nImlac smiled at their terrors, and encouraged them to proceed.  But the\nPrincess continued irresolute till she had been imperceptibly drawn\nforward too far to return.\n\nIn the morning they found some shepherds in the field, who set some milk\nand fruits before them.  The Princess wondered that she did not see a\npalace ready for her reception and a table spread with delicacies; but\nbeing faint and hungry, she drank the milk and ate the fruits, and\nthought them of a higher flavour than the products of the valley.\n\nThey travelled forward by easy journeys, being all unaccustomed to toil\nand difficulty, and knowing that, though they might be missed, they could\nnot be pursued.  In a few days they came into a more populous region,\nwhere Imlac was diverted with the admiration which his companions\nexpressed at the diversity of manners, stations, and employments.  Their\ndress was such as might not bring upon them the suspicion of having\nanything to conceal; yet the Prince, wherever he came, expected to be\nobeyed, and the Princess was frighted because those who came into her\npresence did not prostrate themselves.  Imlac was forced to observe them\nwith great vigilance, lest they should betray their rank by their unusual\nbehaviour, and detained them several weeks in the first village to\naccustom them to the sight of common mortals.\n\nBy degrees the royal wanderers were taught to understand that they had\nfor a time laid aside their dignity, and were to expect only such regard\nas liberality and courtesy could procure.  And Imlac having by many\nadmonitions prepared them to endure the tumults of a port and the\nruggedness of the commercial race, brought them down to the sea-coast.\n\nThe Prince and his sister, to whom everything was new, were gratified\nequally at all places, and therefore remained for some months at the port\nwithout any inclination to pass further.  Imlac was content with their\nstay, because he did not think it safe to expose them, unpractised in the\nworld, to the hazards of a foreign country.\n\nAt last he began to fear lest they should be discovered, and proposed to\nfix a day for their departure.  They had no pretensions to judge for\nthemselves, and referred the whole scheme to his direction.  He therefore\ntook passage in a ship to Suez, and, when the time came, with great\ndifficulty prevailed on the Princess to enter the vessel.  They had a\nquick and prosperous voyage, and from Suez travelled by land to Cairo.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\nTHEY ENTER CAIRO, AND FIND EVERY MAN HAPPY.\n\n\nAS they approached the city, which filled the strangers with\nastonishment, \u201cThis,\u201d said Imlac to the Prince, \u201cis the place where\ntravellers and merchants assemble from all corners of the earth.  You\nwill here find men of every character and every occupation.  Commerce is\nhere honourable.  I will act as a merchant, and you shall live as\nstrangers who have no other end of travel than curiosity; it will soon be\nobserved that we are rich.  Our reputation will procure us access to all\nwhom we shall desire to know; you shall see all the conditions of\nhumanity, and enable yourselves at leisure to make your _choice of\nlife_.\u201d\n\nThey now entered the town, stunned by the noise and offended by the\ncrowds.  Instruction had not yet so prevailed over habit but that they\nwondered to see themselves pass undistinguished along the streets, and\nmet by the lowest of the people without reverence or notice.  The\nPrincess could not at first bear the thought of being levelled with the\nvulgar, and for some time continued in her chamber, where she was served\nby her favourite Pekuah, as in the palace of the valley.\n\nImlac, who understood traffic, sold part of the jewels the next day, and\nhired a house, which he adorned with such magnificence that he was\nimmediately considered as a merchant of great wealth.  His politeness\nattracted many acquaintances, and his generosity made him courted by many\ndependants.  His companions, not being able to mix in the conversation,\ncould make no discovery of their ignorance or surprise, and were\ngradually initiated in the world as they gained knowledge of the\nlanguage.\n\nThe Prince had by frequent lectures been taught the use and nature of\nmoney; but the ladies could not for a long time comprehend what the\nmerchants did with small pieces of gold and silver, or why things of so\nlittle use should be received as an equivalent to the necessaries of\nlife.\n\nThey studied the language two years, while Imlac was preparing to set\nbefore them the various ranks and conditions of mankind.  He grew\nacquainted with all who had anything uncommon in their fortune or\nconduct.  He frequented the voluptuous and the frugal, the idle and the\nbusy, the merchants and the men of learning.\n\nThe Prince now being able to converse with fluency, and having learned\nthe caution necessary to be observed in his intercourse with strangers,\nbegan to accompany Imlac to places of resort, and to enter into all\nassemblies, that he might make his _choice of life_.\n\nFor some time he thought choice needless, because all appeared to him\nreally happy.  Wherever he went he met gaiety and kindness, and heard the\nsong of joy or the laugh of carelessness.  He began to believe that the\nworld overflowed with universal plenty, and that nothing was withheld\neither from want or merit; that every hand showered liberality and every\nheart melted with benevolence: \u201cAnd who then,\u201d says he, \u201cwill be suffered\nto be wretched?\u201d\n\nImlac permitted the pleasing delusion, and was unwilling to crush the\nhope of inexperience: till one day, having sat awhile silent, \u201cI know\nnot,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cwhat can be the reason that I am more unhappy\nthan any of our friends.  I see them perpetually and unalterably\ncheerful, but feel my own mind restless and uneasy.  I am unsatisfied\nwith those pleasures which I seem most to court.  I live in the crowds of\njollity, not so much to enjoy company as to shun myself, and am only loud\nand merry to conceal my sadness.\u201d\n\n\u201cEvery man,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cmay by examining his own mind guess what passes\nin the minds of others.  When you feel that your own gaiety is\ncounterfeit, it may justly lead you to suspect that of your companions\nnot to be sincere.  Envy is commonly reciprocal.  We are long before we\nare convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it\npossessed by others, to keep alive the hope of obtaining it for himself.\nIn the assembly where you passed the last night there appeared such\nsprightliness of air and volatility of fancy as might have suited beings\nof a higher order, formed to inhabit serener regions, inaccessible to\ncare or sorrow; yet, believe me, Prince, was there not one who did not\ndread the moment when solitude should deliver him to the tyranny of\nreflection.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cmay be true of others since it is true of me;\nyet, whatever be the general infelicity of man, one condition is more\nhappy than another, and wisdom surely directs us to take the least evil\nin the _choice of life_.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe causes of good and evil,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201care so various and\nuncertain, so often entangled with each other, so diversified by various\nrelations, and so much subject to accidents which cannot be foreseen,\nthat he who would fix his condition upon incontestable reasons of\npreference must live and die inquiring and deliberating.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, surely,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cthe wise men, to whom we listen with\nreverence and wonder, chose that mode of life for themselves which they\nthought most likely to make them happy.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery few,\u201d said the poet, \u201clive by choice.  Every man is placed in the\npresent condition by causes which acted without his foresight, and with\nwhich he did not always willingly co-operate, and therefore you will\nrarely meet one who does not think the lot of his neighbour better than\nhis own.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am pleased to think,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cthat my birth has given me at\nleast one advantage over others by enabling me to determine for myself.\nI have here the world before me.  I will review it at leisure: surely\nhappiness is somewhere to be found.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\nTHE PRINCE ASSOCIATES WITH YOUNG MEN OF SPIRIT AND GAIETY.\n\n\nRASSELAS rose next day, and resolved to begin his experiments upon life.\n\u201cYouth,\u201d cried he, \u201cis the time of gladness: I will join myself to the\nyoung men whose only business is to gratify their desires, and whose time\nis all spent in a succession of enjoyments.\u201d\n\nTo such societies he was readily admitted, but a few days brought him\nback weary and disgusted.  Their mirth was without images, their laughter\nwithout motive; their pleasures were gross and sensual, in which the mind\nhad no part; their conduct was at once wild and mean\u2014they laughed at\norder and at law, but the frown of power dejected and the eye of wisdom\nabashed them.\n\nThe Prince soon concluded that he should never be happy in a course of\nlife of which he was ashamed.  He thought it unsuitable to a reasonable\nbeing to act without a plan, and to be sad or cheerful only by chance.\n\u201cHappiness,\u201d said he, \u201cmust be something solid and permanent, without\nfear and without uncertainty.\u201d\n\nBut his young companions had gained so much of his regard by their\nfrankness and courtesy that he could not leave them without warning and\nremonstrance.  \u201cMy friends,\u201d said he, \u201cI have seriously considered our\nmanners and our prospects, and find that we have mistaken our own\ninterest.  The first years of man must make provision for the last.  He\nthat never thinks, never can be wise.  Perpetual levity must end in\nignorance; and intemperance, though it may fire the spirits for an hour,\nwill make life short or miserable.  Let us consider that youth is of no\nlong duration, and that in mature age, when the enchantments of fancy\nshall cease, and phantoms of delight dance no more about us, we shall\nhave no comforts but the esteem of wise men and the means of doing good.\nLet us therefore stop while to stop is in our power: let us live as men\nwho are some time to grow old, and to whom it will be the most dreadful\nof all evils to count their past years by follies, and to be reminded of\ntheir former luxuriance of health only by the maladies which riot has\nproduced.\u201d\n\nThey stared awhile in silence one upon another, and at last drove him\naway by a general chorus of continued laughter.\n\nThe consciousness that his sentiments were just and his intention kind\nwas scarcely sufficient to support him against the horror of derision.\nBut he recovered his tranquillity and pursued his search.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\nTHE PRINCE FINDS A WISE AND HAPPY MAN.\n\n\nAS he was one day walking in the street he saw a spacious building which\nall were by the open doors invited to enter.  He followed the stream of\npeople, and found it a hall or school of declamation, in which professors\nread lectures to their auditory.  He fixed his eye upon a sage raised\nabove the rest, who discoursed with great energy on the government of the\npassions.  His look was venerable, his action graceful, his pronunciation\nclear, and his diction elegant.  He showed with great strength of\nsentiment and variety of illustration that human nature is degraded and\ndebased when the lower faculties predominate over the higher; that when\nfancy, the parent of passion, usurps the dominion of the mind, nothing\nensues but the natural effect of unlawful government, perturbation, and\nconfusion; that she betrays the fortresses of the intellect to rebels,\nand excites her children to sedition against their lawful sovereign.  He\ncompared reason to the sun, of which the light is constant, uniform, and\nlasting; and fancy to a meteor, of bright but transitory lustre,\nirregular in its motion and delusive in its direction.\n\nHe then communicated the various precepts given from time to time for the\nconquest of passion, and displayed the happiness of those who had\nobtained the important victory, after which man is no longer the slave of\nfear nor the fool of hope; is no more emaciated by envy, inflamed by\nanger, emasculated by tenderness, or depressed by grief; but walks on\ncalmly through the tumults or privacies of life, as the sun pursues alike\nhis course through the calm or the stormy sky.\n\nHe enumerated many examples of heroes immovable by pain or pleasure, who\nlooked with indifference on those modes or accidents to which the vulgar\ngive the names of good and evil.  He exhorted his hearers to lay aside\ntheir prejudices, and arm themselves against the shafts of malice or\nmisfortune, by invulnerable patience: concluding that this state only was\nhappiness, and that this happiness was in every one\u2019s power.\n\nRasselas listened to him with the veneration due to the instructions of a\nsuperior being, and waiting for him at the door, humbly implored the\nliberty of visiting so great a master of true wisdom.  The lecturer\nhesitated a moment, when Rasselas put a purse of gold into his hand,\nwhich he received with a mixture of joy and wonder.\n\n\u201cI have found,\u201d said the Prince at his return to Imlac, \u201ca man who can\nteach all that is necessary to be known; who, from the unshaken throne of\nrational fortitude, looks down on the scenes of life changing beneath\nhim.  He speaks, and attention watches his lips.  He reasons, and\nconviction closes his periods.  This man shall be my future guide: I will\nlearn his doctrines and imitate his life.\u201d\n\n\u201cBe not too hasty,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cto trust or to admire the teachers of\nmorality: they discourse like angels, but they live like men.\u201d\n\nRasselas, who could not conceive how any man could reason so forcibly\nwithout feeling the cogency of his own arguments, paid his visit in a few\ndays, and was denied admission.  He had now learned the power of money,\nand made his way by a piece of gold to the inner apartment, where he\nfound the philosopher in a room half darkened, with his eyes misty and\nhis face pale.  \u201cSir,\u201d said he, \u201cyou are come at a time when all human\nfriendship is useless; what I suffer cannot be remedied: what I have lost\ncannot be supplied.  My daughter, my only daughter, from whose tenderness\nI expected all the comforts of my age, died last night of a fever.  My\nviews, my purposes, my hopes, are at an end: I am now a lonely being,\ndisunited from society.\u201d\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cmortality is an event by which a wise man can\nnever be surprised: we know that death is always near, and it should\ntherefore always be expected.\u201d  \u201cYoung man,\u201d answered the philosopher,\n\u201cyou speak like one that has never felt the pangs of separation.\u201d  \u201cHave\nyou then forgot the precepts,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cwhich you so powerfully\nenforced?  Has wisdom no strength to arm the heart against calamity?\nConsider that external things are naturally variable, but truth and\nreason are always the same.\u201d  \u201cWhat comfort,\u201d said the mourner, \u201ccan\ntruth and reason afford me?  Of what effect are they now, but to tell me\nthat my daughter will not be restored?\u201d\n\nThe Prince, whose humanity would not suffer him to insult misery with\nreproof, went away, convinced of the emptiness of rhetorical sounds, and\nthe inefficacy of polished periods and studied sentences.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\nA GLIMPSE OF PASTORAL LIFE.\n\n\nHE was still eager upon the same inquiry; and having heard of a hermit\nthat lived near the lowest cataract of the Nile, and filled the whole\ncountry with the fame of his sanctity, resolved to visit his retreat, and\ninquire whether that felicity which public life could not afford was to\nbe found in solitude, and whether a man whose age and virtue made him\nvenerable could teach any peculiar art of shunning evils or enduring\nthem.\n\nImlac and the Princess agreed to accompany him, and after the necessary\npreparations, they began their journey.  Their way lay through the\nfields, where shepherds tended their flocks and the lambs were playing\nupon the pasture.  \u201cThis,\u201d said the poet, \u201cis the life which has been\noften celebrated for its innocence and quiet; let us pass the heat of the\nday among the shepherds\u2019 tents, and know whether all our searches are not\nto terminate in pastoral simplicity.\u201d\n\nThe proposal pleased them; and they induced the shepherds, by small\npresents and familiar questions, to tell the opinion of their own state.\nThey were so rude and ignorant, so little able to compare the good with\nthe evil of the occupation, and so indistinct in their narratives and\ndescriptions, that very little could be learned from them.  But it was\nevident that their hearts were cankered with discontent; that they\nconsidered themselves as condemned to labour for the luxury of the rich,\nand looked up with stupid malevolence towards those that were placed\nabove them.\n\nThe Princess pronounced with vehemence that she would never suffer these\nenvious savages to be her companions, and that she should not soon be\ndesirous of seeing any more specimens of rustic happiness; but could not\nbelieve that all the accounts of primeval pleasures were fabulous, and\nwas in doubt whether life had anything that could be justly preferred to\nthe placid gratification of fields and woods.  She hoped that the time\nwould come when, with a few virtuous and elegant companions, she should\ngather flowers planted by her own hands, fondle the lambs of her own ewe,\nand listen without care, among brooks and breezes, to one of her maidens\nreading in the shade.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\nTHE DANGER OF PROSPERITY.\n\n\nON the next day they continued their journey till the heat compelled them\nto look round for shelter.  At a small distance they saw a thick wood,\nwhich they no sooner entered than they perceived that they were\napproaching the habitations of men.  The shrubs were diligently cut away\nto open walks where the shades ware darkest; the boughs of opposite trees\nwere artificially interwoven; seats of flowery turf were raised in vacant\nspaces; and a rivulet that wantoned along the side of a winding path had\nits banks sometimes opened into small basins, and its stream sometimes\nobstructed by little mounds of stone heaped together to increase its\nmurmurs.\n\nThey passed slowly through the wood, delighted with such unexpected\naccommodations, and entertained each other with conjecturing what or who\nhe could be that in those rude and unfrequented regions had leisure and\nart for such harmless luxury.\n\nAs they advanced they heard the sound of music, and saw youths and\nvirgins dancing in the grove; and going still farther beheld a stately\npalace built upon a hill surrounded by woods.  The laws of Eastern\nhospitality allowed them to enter, and the master welcomed them like a\nman liberal and wealthy.\n\nHe was skilful enough in appearances soon to discern that they were no\ncommon guests, and spread his table with magnificence.  The eloquence of\nImlac caught his attention, and the lofty courtesy of the Princess\nexcited his respect.  When they offered to depart, he entreated their\nstay, and was the next day more unwilling to dismiss them than before.\nThey were easily persuaded to stop, and civility grew up in time to\nfreedom and confidence.\n\nThe Prince now saw all the domestics cheerful and all the face of nature\nsmiling round the place, and could not forbear to hope that he should\nfind here what he was seeking; but when he was congratulating the master\nupon his possessions he answered with a sigh, \u201cMy condition has indeed\nthe appearance of happiness, but appearances are delusive.  My prosperity\nputs my life in danger; the Bassa of Egypt is my enemy, incensed only by\nmy wealth and popularity.  I have been hitherto protected against him by\nthe princes of the country; but as the favour of the great is uncertain I\nknow not how soon my defenders may be persuaded to share the plunder with\nthe Bassa.  I have sent my treasures into a distant country, and upon the\nfirst alarm am prepared to follow them.  Then will my enemies riot in my\nmansion, and enjoy the gardens which I have planted.\u201d\n\nThey all joined in lamenting his danger and deprecating his exile; and\nthe Princess was so much disturbed with the tumult of grief and\nindignation that she retired to her apartment.  They continued with their\nkind inviter a few days longer, and then went to find the hermit.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\nTHE HAPPINESS OF SOLITUDE\u2014THE HERMIT\u2019S HISTORY.\n\n\nTHEY came on the third day, by the direction of the peasants, to the\nhermit\u2019s cell.  It was a cavern in the side of a mountain, overshadowed\nwith palm trees, at such a distance from the cataract that nothing more\nwas heard than a gentle uniform murmur, such as composes the mind to\npensive meditation, especially when it was assisted by the wind whistling\namong the branches.  The first rude essay of Nature had been so much\nimproved by human labour that the cave contained several apartments\nappropriated to different uses, and often afforded lodging to travellers\nwhom darkness or tempests happened to overtake.\n\nThe hermit sat on a bench at the door, to enjoy the coolness of the\nevening.  On one side lay a book with pens and paper; on the other\nmechanical instruments of various kinds.  As they approached him\nunregarded, the Princess observed that he had not the countenance of a\nman that had found or could teach the way to happiness.\n\nThey saluted him with great respect, which he repaid like a man not\nunaccustomed to the forms of Courts.  \u201cMy children,\u201d said he, \u201cif you\nhave lost your way, you shall be willingly supplied with such\nconveniences for the night as this cavern will afford.  I have all that\nNature requires, and you will not expect delicacies in a hermit\u2019s cell.\u201d\n\nThey thanked him; and, entering, were pleased with the neatness and\nregularity of the place.  The hermit set flesh and wine before them,\nthough he fed only upon fruits and water.  His discourse was cheerful\nwithout levity, and pious without enthusiasm.  He soon gained the esteem\nof his guests, and the Princess repented her hasty censure.\n\nAt last Imlac began thus: \u201cI do not now wonder that your reputation is so\nfar extended: we have heard at Cairo of your wisdom, and came hither to\nimplore your direction for this young man and maiden in the _choice of\nlife_.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo him that lives well,\u201d answered the hermit, \u201cevery form of life is\ngood; nor can I give any other rule for choice than to remove all\napparent evil.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe will most certainly remove from evil,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cwho shall\ndevote himself to that solitude which you have recommended by your\nexample.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have indeed lived fifteen years in solitude,\u201d said the hermit, \u201cbut\nhave no desire that my example should gain any imitators.  In my youth I\nprofessed arms, and was raised by degrees to the highest military rank.\nI have traversed wide countries at the head of my troops, and seen many\nbattles and sieges.  At last, being disgusted by the preferments of a\nyounger officer, and feeling that my vigour was beginning to decay, I\nresolved to close my life in peace, having found the world full of\nsnares, discord, and misery.  I had once escaped from the pursuit of the\nenemy by the shelter of this cavern, and therefore chose it for my final\nresidence.  I employed artificers to form it into chambers, and stored it\nwith all that I was likely to want.\n\n\u201cFor some time after my retreat I rejoiced like a tempest-beaten sailor\nat his entrance into the harbour, being delighted with the sudden change\nof the noise and hurry of war to stillness and repose.  When the pleasure\nof novelty went away, I employed my hours in examining the plants which\ngrow in the valley, and the minerals which I collected from the rocks.\nBut that inquiry is now grown tasteless and irksome.  I have been for\nsome time unsettled and distracted: my mind is disturbed with a thousand\nperplexities of doubt and vanities of imagination, which hourly prevail\nupon me, because I have no opportunities of relaxation or diversion.  I\nam sometimes ashamed to think that I could not secure myself from vice\nbut by retiring from the exercise of virtue, and begin to suspect that I\nwas rather impelled by resentment than led by devotion into solitude.  My\nfancy riots in scenes of folly, and I lament that I have lost so much,\nand have gained so little.  In solitude, if I escape the example of bad\nmen, I want likewise the counsel and conversation of the good.  I have\nbeen long comparing the evils with the advantages of society, and resolve\nto return into the world to-morrow.  The life of a solitary man will be\ncertainly miserable, but not certainly devout.\u201d\n\nThey heard his resolution with surprise, but after a short pause offered\nto conduct him to Cairo.  He dug up a considerable treasure which he had\nhid among the rocks, and accompanied them to the city, on which, as he\napproached it, he gazed with rapture.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\nTHE HAPPINESS OF A LIFE LED ACCORDING TO NATURE.\n\n\nRASSELAS went often to an assembly of learned men, who met at stated\ntimes to unbend their minds and compare their opinions.  Their manners\nwere somewhat coarse, but their conversation was instructive, and their\ndisputations acute, though sometimes too violent, and often continued\ntill neither controvertist remembered upon what question he began.  Some\nfaults were almost general among them: every one was pleased to hear the\ngenius or knowledge of another depreciated.\n\nIn this assembly Rasselas was relating his interview with the hermit, and\nthe wonder with which he heard him censure a course of life which he had\nso deliberately chosen and so laudably followed.  The sentiments of the\nhearers were various.  Some were of opinion that the folly of his choice\nhad been justly punished by condemnation to perpetual perseverance.  One\nof the youngest among them, with great vehemence, pronounced him a\nhypocrite.  Some talked of the right of society to the labour of\nindividuals, and considered retirement as a desertion of duty.  Others\nreadily allowed that there was a time when the claims of the public were\nsatisfied, and when a man might properly sequester himself, to review his\nlife and purify his heart.\n\nOne who appeared more affected with the narrative than the rest thought\nit likely that the hermit would in a few years go back to his retreat,\nand perhaps, if shame did not restrain or death intercept him, return\nonce more from his retreat into the world.  \u201cFor the hope of happiness,\u201d\nsaid he, \u201cis so strongly impressed that the longest experience is not\nable to efface it.  Of the present state, whatever it be, we feel and are\nforced to confess the misery; yet when the same state is again at a\ndistance, imagination paints it as desirable.  But the time will surely\ncome when desire will no longer be our torment and no man shall be\nwretched but by his own fault.\n\n\u201cThis,\u201d said a philosopher who had heard him with tokens of great\nimpatience, \u201cis the present condition of a wise man.  The time is already\ncome when none are wretched but by their own fault.  Nothing is more idle\nthan to inquire after happiness which Nature has kindly placed within our\nreach.  The way to be happy is to live according to Nature, in obedience\nto that universal and unalterable law with which every heart is\noriginally impressed; which is not written on it by precept, but engraven\nby destiny; not instilled by education, but infused at our nativity.  He\nthat lives according to Nature will suffer nothing from the delusions of\nhope or importunities of desire; he will receive and reject with\nequability of temper; and act or suffer as the reason of things shall\nalternately prescribe.  Other men may amuse themselves with subtle\ndefinitions or intricate ratiocination.  Let them learn to be wise by\neasier means: let them observe the hind of the forest and the linnet of\nthe grove: let them consider the life of animals, whose motions are\nregulated by instinct; they obey their guide, and are happy.  Let us\ntherefore at length cease to dispute, and learn to live: throw away the\nencumbrance of precepts, which they who utter them with so much pride and\npomp do not understand, and carry with us this simple and intelligible\nmaxim: that deviation from Nature is deviation from happiness.\u201d\n\nWhen he had spoken he looked round him with a placid air, and enjoyed the\nconsciousness of his own beneficence.\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d said the Prince with great modesty, \u201cas I, like all the rest of\nmankind, am desirous of felicity, my closest attention has been fixed\nupon your discourse: I doubt not the truth of a position which a man so\nlearned has so confidently advanced.  Let me only know what it is to live\naccording to Nature.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen I find young men so humble and so docile,\u201d said the philosopher, \u201cI\ncan deny them no information which my studies have enabled me to afford.\nTo live according to Nature is to act always with due regard to the\nfitness arising from the relations and qualities of causes and effects;\nto concur with the great and unchangeable scheme of universal felicity;\nto co-operate with the general disposition and tendency of the present\nsystem of things.\u201d\n\nThe Prince soon found that this was one of the sages whom he should\nunderstand less as he heard him longer.  He therefore bowed and was\nsilent; and the philosopher, supposing him satisfied and the rest\nvanquished, rose up and departed with the air of a man that had\nco-operated with the present system.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\nTHE PRINCE AND HIS SISTER DIVIDE BETWEEN THEM THE WORK OF OBSERVATION.\n\n\nRASSELAS returned home full of reflections, doubting how to direct his\nfuture steps.  Of the way to happiness he found the learned and simple\nequally ignorant; but as he was yet young, he flattered himself that he\nhad time remaining for more experiments and further inquiries.  He\ncommunicated to Imlac his observations and his doubts, but was answered\nby him with new doubts and remarks that gave him no comfort.  He\ntherefore discoursed more frequently and freely with his sister, who had\nyet the same hope with himself, and always assisted him to give some\nreason why, though he had been hitherto frustrated, he might succeed at\nlast.\n\n\u201cWe have hitherto,\u201d said she, \u201cknown but little of the world; we have\nnever yet been either great or mean.  In our own country, though we had\nroyalty, we had no power; and in this we have not yet seen the private\nrecesses of domestic peace.  Imlac favours not our search, lest we should\nin time find him mistaken.  We will divide the task between us; you shall\ntry what is to be found in the splendour of Courts, and I will range the\nshades of humbler life.  Perhaps command and authority may be the supreme\nblessings, as they afford the most opportunities of doing good; or\nperhaps what this world can give may be found in the modest habitations\nof middle fortune\u2014too low for great designs, and too high for penury and\ndistress.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\nTHE PRINCE EXAMINES THE HAPPINESS OF HIGH STATIONS.\n\n\nRASSELAS applauded the design, and appeared next day with a splendid\nretinue at the Court of the Bassa.  He was soon distinguished for his\nmagnificence, and admitted, as a Prince whose curiosity had brought him\nfrom distant countries, to an intimacy with the great officers and\nfrequent conversation with the Bassa himself.\n\nHe was at first inclined to believe that the man must be pleased with his\nown condition whom all approached with reverence and heard with\nobedience, and who had the power to extend his edicts to a whole kingdom.\n\u201cThere can be no pleasure,\u201d said he, \u201cequal to that of feeling at once\nthe joy of thousands all made happy by wise administration.  Yet, since\nby the law of subordination this sublime delight can be in one nation but\nthe lot of one, it is surely reasonable to think that there is some\nsatisfaction more popular and accessible, and that millions can hardly be\nsubjected to the will of a single man, only to fill his particular breast\nwith incommunicable content.\u201d\n\nThese thoughts were often in his mind, and he found no solution of the\ndifficulty.  But as presents and civilities gained him more familiarity,\nhe found that almost every man who stood high in his employment hated all\nthe rest and was hated by them, and that their lives were a continual\nsuccession of plots and detections, stratagems and escapes, faction and\ntreachery.  Many of those who surrounded the Bassa were sent only to\nwatch and report his conduct: every tongue was muttering censure, and\nevery eye was searching for a fault.\n\nAt last the letters of revocation arrived: the Bassa was carried in\nchains to Constantinople, and his name was mentioned no more.\n\n\u201cWhat are we now to think of the prerogatives of power?\u201d said Rasselas to\nhis sister: \u201cis it without efficacy to good, or is the subordinate degree\nonly dangerous, and the supreme safe and glorious?  Is the Sultan the\nonly happy man in his dominions, or is the Sultan himself subject to the\ntorments of suspicion and the dread of enemies?\u201d\n\nIn a short time the second Bassa was deposed.  The Sultan that had\nadvanced him was murdered by the Janissaries, and his successor had other\nviews or different favourites.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\nTHE PRINCESS PURSUES HER INQUIRY WITH MORE DILIGENCE THAN SUCCESS.\n\n\nTHE Princess in the meantime insinuated herself into many families; for\nthere are few doors through which liberality, joined with good humour,\ncannot find its way.  The daughters of many houses were airy and\ncheerful; but Nekayah had been too long accustomed to the conversation of\nImlac and her brother to be much pleased with childish levity and prattle\nwhich had no meaning.  She found their thoughts narrow, their wishes low,\nand their merriment often artificial.  Their pleasures, poor as they\nwere, could not be preserved pure, but were embittered by petty\ncompetitions and worthless emulation.  They were always jealous of the\nbeauty of each other, of a quality to which solicitude can add nothing,\nand from which detraction can take nothing away.  Many were in love with\ntriflers like themselves, and many fancied that they were in love when in\ntruth they were only idle.  Their affection was not fixed on sense or\nvirtue, and therefore seldom ended but in vexation.  Their grief,\nhowever, like their joy, was transient; everything floated in their mind\nunconnected with the past or future, so that one desire easily gave way\nto another, as a second stone, cast into the water, effaces and confounds\nthe circles of the first.\n\nWith these girls she played as with inoffensive animals, and found them\nproud of her countenance and weary of her company.\n\nBut her purpose was to examine more deeply, and her affability easily\npersuaded the hearts that were swelling with sorrow to discharge their\nsecrets in her ear, and those whom hope flattered or prosperity delighted\noften courted her to partake their pleasure.\n\nThe Princess and her brother commonly met in the evening in a private\nsummerhouse on the banks of the Nile, and related to each other the\noccurrences of the day.  As they were sitting together the Princess cast\nher eyes upon the river that flowed before her.  \u201cAnswer,\u201d said she,\n\u201cgreat father of waters, thou that rollest thy goods through eighty\nnations, to the invocations of the daughter of thy native king.  Tell me\nif thou waterest through all thy course a single habitation from which\nthou dost not hear the murmurs of complaint.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are then,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cnot more successful in private houses\nthan I have been in Courts.\u201d  \u201cI have, since the last partition of our\nprovinces,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cenabled myself to enter familiarly into\nmany families, where there was the fairest show of prosperity and peace,\nand know not one house that is not haunted by some fury that destroys\ntheir quiet.\n\n\u201cI did not seek ease among the poor, because I concluded that there it\ncould not be found.  But I saw many poor whom I had supposed to live in\naffluence.  Poverty has in large cities very different appearances.  It\nis often concealed in splendour and often in extravagance.  It is the\ncare of a very great part of mankind to conceal their indigence from the\nrest.  They support themselves by temporary expedients, and every day is\nlost in contriving for the morrow.\n\n\u201cThis, however, was an evil which, though frequent, I saw with less pain,\nbecause I could relieve it.  Yet some have refused my bounties; more\noffended with my quickness to detect their wants than pleased with my\nreadiness to succour them; and others, whose exigencies compelled them to\nadmit my kindness, have never been able to forgive their benefactress.\nMany, however, have been sincerely grateful without the ostentation of\ngratitude or the hope of other favours.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\nTHE PRINCESS CONTINUES HER REMARKS UPON PRIVATE LIFE.\n\n\nNEKAYAH, perceiving her brother\u2019s attention fixed, proceeded in her\nnarrative.\n\n\u201cIn families where there is or is not poverty there is commonly discord.\nIf a kingdom be, as Imlac tells us, a great family, a family likewise is\na little kingdom, torn with factions and exposed to revolutions.  An\nunpractised observer expects the love of parents and children to be\nconstant and equal.  But this kindness seldom continues beyond the years\nof infancy; in a short time the children become rivals to their parents.\nBenefits are allowed by reproaches, and gratitude debased by envy.\n\n\u201cParents and children seldom act in concert; each child endeavours to\nappropriate the esteem or the fondness of the parents; and the parents,\nwith yet less temptation, betray each other to their children.  Thus,\nsome place their confidence in the father and some in the mother, and by\ndegrees the house is filled with artifices and feuds.\n\n\u201cThe opinions of children and parents, of the young and the old, are\nnaturally opposite, by the contrary effects of hope and despondency, of\nexpectation and experience, without crime or folly on either side.  The\ncolours of life in youth and age appear different, as the face of Nature\nin spring and winter.  And how can children credit the assertions of\nparents which their own eyes show them to be false?\n\n\u201cFew parents act in such a manner as much to enforce their maxims by the\ncredit of their lives.  The old man trusts wholly to slow contrivance and\ngradual progression; the youth expects to force his way by genius,\nvigour, and precipitance.  The old man pays regard to riches, and the\nyouth reverences virtue.  The old man deifies prudence; the youth commits\nhimself to magnanimity and chance.  The young man, who intends no ill,\nbelieves that none is intended, and therefore acts with openness and\ncandour; but his father; having suffered the injuries of fraud, is\nimpelled to suspect and too often allured to practise it.  Age looks with\nanger on the temerity of youth, and youth with contempt on the\nscrupulosity of age.  Thus parents and children for the greatest part\nlive on to love less and less; and if those whom Nature has thus closely\nunited are the torments of each other, where shall we look for tenderness\nand consolations?\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cyou must have been unfortunate in your choice\nof acquaintance.  I am unwilling to believe that the most tender of all\nrelations is thus impeded in its effects by natural necessity.\u201d\n\n\u201cDomestic discord,\u201d answered she, \u201cis not inevitably and fatally\nnecessary, but yet it is not easily avoided.  We seldom see that a whole\nfamily is virtuous; the good and the evil cannot well agree, and the evil\ncan yet less agree with one another.  Even the virtuous fall sometimes to\nvariance, when their virtues are of different kinds and tending to\nextremes.  In general, those parents have most reverence who most deserve\nit, for he that lives well cannot be despised.\n\n\u201cMany other evils infest private life.  Some are the slaves of servants\nwhom they have trusted with their affairs.  Some are kept in continual\nanxiety by the caprice of rich relations, whom they cannot please and\ndare not offend.  Some husbands are imperious and some wives perverse,\nand, as it is always more easy to do evil than good, though the wisdom or\nvirtue of one can very rarely make many happy, the folly or vice of one\nmakes many miserable.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf such be the general effect of marriage,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cI shall\nfor the future think it dangerous to connect my interest with that of\nanother, lest I should be unhappy by my partner\u2019s fault.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have met,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cwith many who live single for that\nreason, but I never found that their prudence ought to raise envy.  They\ndream away their time without friendship, without fondness, and are\ndriven to rid themselves of the day, for which they have no use, by\nchildish amusements or vicious delights.  They act as beings under the\nconstant sense of some known inferiority that fills their minds with\nrancour and their tongues with censure.  They are peevish at home and\nmalevolent abroad, and, as the outlaws of human nature, make it their\nbusiness and their pleasure to disturb that society which debars them\nfrom its privileges.  To live without feeling or exciting sympathy, to be\nfortunate without adding to the felicity of others, or afflicted without\ntasting the balm of pity, is a state more gloomy than solitude; it is not\nretreat but exclusion from mankind.  Marriage has many pains, but\ncelibacy has no pleasures.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat then is to be done?\u201d said Rasselas.  \u201cThe more we inquire the less\nwe can resolve.  Surely he is most likely to please himself that has no\nother inclination to regard.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\nDISQUISITION UPON GREATNESS.\n\n\nTHE conversation had a short pause.  The Prince, having considered his\nsister\u2019s observation, told her that she had surveyed life with prejudice\nand supposed misery where she did not find it.  \u201cYour narrative,\u201d says\nhe, \u201cthrows yet a darker gloom upon the prospects of futurity.  The\npredictions of Imlac were but faint sketches of the evils painted by\nNekayah.  I have been lately convinced that quiet is not the daughter of\ngrandeur or of power; that her presence is not to be bought by wealth nor\nenforced by conquest.  It is evident that as any man acts in a wider\ncompass he must be more exposed to opposition from enmity or miscarriage\nfrom chance.  Whoever has many to please or to govern must use the\nministry of many agents, some of whom will be wicked and some ignorant,\nby some he will be misled and by others betrayed.  If he gratifies one he\nwill offend another; those that are not favoured will think themselves\ninjured, and since favours can be conferred but upon few the greater\nnumber will be always discontented.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe discontent,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cwhich is thus unreasonable, I hope\nthat I shall always have spirit to despise and you power to repress.\u201d\n\n\u201cDiscontent,\u201d answered Rasselas, \u201cwill not always be without reason under\nthe most just and vigilant administration of public affairs.  None,\nhowever attentive, can always discover that merit which indigence or\nfaction may happen to obscure, and none, however powerful, can always\nreward it.  Yet he that sees inferior desert advanced above him will\nnaturally impute that preference to partiality or caprice, and indeed it\ncan scarcely be hoped that any man, however magnanimous by Nature or\nexalted by condition, will be able to persist for ever in fixed and\ninexorable justice of distribution; he will sometimes indulge his own\naffections and sometimes those of his favourites; he will permit some to\nplease him who can never serve him; he will discover in those whom he\nloves qualities which in reality they do not possess, and to those from\nwhom he receives pleasure he will in his turn endeavour to give it.  Thus\nwill recommendations sometimes prevail which were purchased by money or\nby the more destructive bribery of flattery and servility.\n\n\u201cHe that hath much to do will do something wrong, and of that wrong must\nsuffer the consequences, and if it were possible that he should always\nact rightly, yet, when such numbers are to judge of his conduct, the bad\nwill censure and obstruct him by malevolence and the good sometimes by\nmistake.\n\n\u201cThe highest stations cannot therefore hope to be the abodes of\nhappiness, which I would willingly believe to have fled from thrones and\npalaces to seats of humble privacy and placid obscurity.  For what can\nhinder the satisfaction or intercept the expectations of him whose\nabilities are adequate to his employments, who sees with his own eyes the\nwhole circuit of his influence, who chooses by his own knowledge all whom\nhe trusts, and whom none are tempted to deceive by hope or fear?  Surely\nhe has nothing to do but to love and to be loved; to be virtuous and to\nbe happy.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhether perfect happiness would be procured by perfect goodness,\u201d said\nNekayah, \u201cthis world will never afford an opportunity of deciding.  But\nthis, at least, may be maintained, that we do not always find visible\nhappiness in proportion to visible virtue.  All natural and almost all\npolitical evils are incident alike to the bad and good; they are\nconfounded in the misery of a famine, and not much distinguished in the\nfury of a faction; they sink together in a tempest and are driven\ntogether from their country by invaders.  All that virtue can afford is\nquietness of conscience and a steady prospect of a happier state; this\nmay enable us to endure calamity with patience, but remember that\npatience must oppose pain.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\nRASSELAS AND NEKAYAH CONTINUE THEIR CONVERSATION.\n\n\n\u201cDEAR Princess,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cyou fall into the common errors of\nexaggeratory declamation, by producing in a familiar disquisition\nexamples of national calamities and scenes of extensive misery which are\nfound in books rather than in the world, and which, as they are horrid,\nare ordained to be rare.  Let us not imagine evils which we do not feel,\nnor injure life by misrepresentations.  I cannot bear that querulous\neloquence which threatens every city with a siege like that of Jerusalem,\nthat makes famine attend on every flight of locust, and suspends\npestilence on the wing of every blast that issues from the south.\n\n\u201cOn necessary and inevitable evils which overwhelm kingdoms at once all\ndisputation is vain; when they happen they must be endured.  But it is\nevident that these bursts of universal distress are more dreaded than\nfelt; thousands and tens of thousands flourish in youth and wither in\nage, without the knowledge of any other than domestic evils, and share\nthe same pleasures and vexations, whether their kings are mild or cruel,\nwhether the armies of their country pursue their enemies or retreat\nbefore them.  While Courts are disturbed with intestine competitions and\nambassadors are negotiating in foreign countries, the smith still plies\nhis anvil and the husbandman drives his plough forward; the necessaries\nof life are required and obtained, and the successive business of the\nseason continues to make its wonted revolutions.\n\n\u201cLet us cease to consider what perhaps may never happen, and what, when\nit shall happen, will laugh at human speculation.  We will not endeavour\nto modify the motions of the elements or to fix the destiny of kingdoms.\nIt is our business to consider what beings like us may perform, each\nlabouring for his own happiness by promoting within his circle, however\nnarrow, the happiness of others.\n\n\u201cMarriage is evidently the dictate of Nature; men and women were made to\nbe the companions of each other, and therefore I cannot be persuaded but\nthat marriage is one of the means of happiness.\u201d\n\n\u201cI know not,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cwhether marriage be more than one of\nthe innumerable modes of human misery.  When I see and reckon the various\nforms of connubial infelicity, the unexpected causes of lasting discord,\nthe diversities of temper, the oppositions of opinion, the rude\ncollisions of contrary desire where both are urged by violent impulses,\nthe obstinate contest of disagreeing virtues where both are supported by\nconsciousness of good intention, I am sometimes disposed to think, with\nthe severer casuists of most nations, that marriage is rather permitted\nthan approved, and that none, but by the instigation of a passion too\nmuch indulged, entangle themselves with indissoluble compact.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou seem to forget,\u201d replied Rasselas, \u201cthat you have, even now\nrepresented celibacy as less happy than marriage.  Both conditions may be\nbad, but they cannot both be worse.  Thus it happens, when wrong opinions\nare entertained, that they mutually destroy each other and leave the mind\nopen to truth.\u201d\n\n\u201cI did not expect,\u201d answered, the Princess, \u201cto hear that imputed to\nfalsehood which is the consequence only of frailty.  To the mind, as to\nthe eye, it is difficult to compare with exactness objects vast in their\nextent and various in their parts.  When we see or conceive the whole at\nonce, we readily note the discriminations and decide the preference, but\nof two systems, of which neither can be surveyed by any human being in\nits full compass of magnitude and multiplicity of complication, where is\nthe wonder that, judging of the whole by parts, I am alternately affected\nby one and the other as either presses on my memory or fancy?  We differ\nfrom ourselves just as we differ from each other when we see only part of\nthe question, as in the multifarious relations of politics and morality,\nbut when we perceive the whole at once, as in numerical computations, all\nagree in one judgment, and none ever varies in his opinion.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us not add,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cto the other evils of life the\nbitterness of controversy, nor endeavour to vie with each other in\nsubtilties of argument.  We are employed in a search of which both are\nequally to enjoy the success or suffer by the miscarriage; it is\ntherefore fit that we assist each other.  You surely conclude too hastily\nfrom the infelicity of marriage against its institution; will not the\nmisery of life prove equally that life cannot be the gift of Heaven?  The\nworld must be peopled by marriage or peopled without it.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow the world is to be peopled,\u201d returned Nekayah, \u201cis not my care and\nneed not be yours.  I see no danger that the present generation should\nomit to leave successors behind them; we are not now inquiring for the\nworld, but for ourselves.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\nTHE DEBATE ON MARRIAGE (_continued_).\n\n\n\u201cTHE good of the whole,\u201d says Rasselas, \u201cis the same with the good of all\nits parts.  If marriage be best for mankind, it must be evidently best\nfor individuals; or a permanent and necessary duty must be the cause of\nevil, and some must be inevitably sacrificed to the convenience of\nothers.  In the estimate which you have made of the two states, it\nappears that the incommodities of a single life are in a great measure\nnecessary and certain, but those of the conjugal state accidental and\navoidable.  I cannot forbear to flatter myself that prudence and\nbenevolence will make marriage happy.  The general folly of mankind is\nthe cause of general complaint.  What can be expected but disappointment\nand repentance from a choice made in the immaturity of youth, in the\nardour of desire, without judgment, without foresight, without inquiry\nafter conformity of opinions, similarity of manners, rectitude of\njudgment, or purity of sentiment?\n\n\u201cSuch is the common process of marriage.  A youth and maiden, meeting by\nchance or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate\ncivilities, go home and dream of one another.  Having little to divert\nattention or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are\napart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together.  They\nmarry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blindness before had\nconcealed; they wear out life in altercations, and charge Nature with\ncruelty.\n\n\u201cFrom those early marriages proceeds likewise the rivalry of parents and\nchildren: the son is eager to enjoy the world before the father is\nwilling to forsake it, and there is hardly room at once for two\ngenerations.  The daughter begins to bloom before the mother can be\ncontent to fade, and neither can forbear to wish for the absence of the\nother.\n\n\u201cSurely all these evils may be avoided by that deliberation and delay\nwhich prudence prescribes to irrevocable choice.  In the variety and\njollity of youthful pleasures, life may be well enough supported without\nthe help of a partner.  Longer time will increase experience, and wider\nviews will allow better opportunities of inquiry and selection; one\nadvantage at least will be certain, the parents will be visibly older\nthan their children.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat reason cannot collect,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cand what experiment has not\nyet taught, can be known only from the report of others.  I have been\ntold that late marriages are not eminently happy.  This is a question too\nimportant to be neglected; and I have often proposed it to those whose\naccuracy of remark and comprehensiveness of knowledge made their\nsuffrages worthy of regard.  They have generally determined that it is\ndangerous for a man and woman to suspend their fate upon each other at a\ntime when opinions are fixed and habits are established, when friendships\nhave been contracted on both sides, when life has been planned into\nmethod, and the mind has long enjoyed the contemplation of its own\nprospects.\n\n\u201cIt is scarcely possible that two travelling through the world under the\nconduct of chance should have been both directed to the same path, and it\nwill not often happen that either will quit the track which custom has\nmade pleasing.  When the desultory levity of youth has settled into\nregularity, it is soon succeeded by pride ashamed to yield, or obstinacy\ndelighting to contend.  And even though mutual esteem produces mutual\ndesire to please, time itself, as it modifies unchangeably the external\nmien, determines likewise the direction of the passions, and gives an\ninflexible rigidity to the manners.  Long customs are not easily broken;\nhe that attempts to change the course of his own life very often labours\nin vain, and how shall we do that for others which we are seldom able to\ndo for ourselves?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut surely,\u201d interposed the Prince, \u201cyou suppose the chief motive of\nchoice forgotten or neglected.  Whenever I shall seek a wife, it shall be\nmy first question whether she be willing to be led by reason.\u201d\n\n\u201cThus it is,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cthat philosophers are deceived.  There are a\nthousand familiar disputes which reason never can decide; questions that\nelude investigation, and make logic ridiculous; cases where something\nmust be done, and where little can be said.  Consider the state of\nmankind, and inquire how few can be supposed to act upon any occasions,\nwhether small or great, with all the reasons of action present to their\nminds.  Wretched would be the pair, above all names of wretchedness, who\nshould be doomed to adjust by reason every morning all the minute details\nof a domestic day.\n\n\u201cThose who marry at an advanced age will probably escape the\nencroachments of their children, but in the diminution of this advantage\nthey will be likely to leave them, ignorant and helpless, to a guardian\u2019s\nmercy; or if that should not happen, they must at least go out of the\nworld before they see those whom they love best either wise or great.\n\n\u201cFrom their children, if they have less to fear, they have less also to\nhope; and they lose without equivalent the joys of early love, and the\nconvenience of uniting with manners pliant and minds susceptible of new\nimpressions, which might wear away their dissimilitudes by long\ncohabitation, as soft bodies by continual attrition conform their\nsurfaces to each other.\n\n\u201cI believe it will be found that those who marry late are best pleased\nwith their children, and those who marry early with their partners.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe union of these two affections,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cwould produce all\nthat could be wished.  Perhaps there is a time when marriage might unite\nthem\u2014a time neither too early for the father nor too late for the\nhusband.\u201d\n\n\u201cEvery hour,\u201d answered the Princess, \u201cconfirms my prejudice in favour of\nthe position so often uttered by the mouth of Imlac, that \u2018Nature sets\nher gifts on the right hand and on the left.\u2019  Those conditions which\nflatter hope and attract desire are so constituted that as we approach\none we recede from another.  There are goods so opposed that we cannot\nseize both, but by too much prudence may pass between them at too great a\ndistance to reach either.  This is often the fate of long consideration;\nhe does nothing who endeavours to do more than is allowed to humanity.\nFlatter not yourself with contrarieties of pleasure.  Of the blessings\nset before you make your choice, and be content.  No man can taste the\nfruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of the\nspring; no man can at the same time fill his cup from the source and from\nthe mouth of the Nile.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX\nIMLAC ENTERS, AND CHANGES THE CONVERSATION.\n\n\nHERE Imlac entered, and interrupted them.  \u201cImlac,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cI\nhave been taking from the Princess the dismal history of private life,\nand am almost discouraged from further search.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt seems to me,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cthat while you are making the choice of\nlife you neglect to live.  You wander about a single city, which, however\nlarge and diversified, can now afford few novelties, and forget that you\nare in a country famous among the earliest monarchies for the power and\nwisdom of its inhabitants\u2014a country where the sciences first dawned that\nilluminate the world, and beyond which the arts cannot be traced of civil\nsociety or domestic life.\n\n\u201cThe old Egyptians have left behind them monuments of industry and power\nbefore which all European magnificence is confessed to fade away.  The\nruins of their architecture are the schools of modern builders; and from\nthe wonders which time has spared we may conjecture, though uncertainly,\nwhat it has destroyed.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy curiosity,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cdoes not very strongly lead me to survey\npiles of stone or mounds of earth.  My business is with man.  I came\nhither not to measure fragments of temples or trace choked aqueducts, but\nto look upon the various scenes of the present world.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe things that are now before us,\u201d said the Princess, \u201crequire\nattention, and deserve it.  What have I to do with the heroes or the\nmonuments of ancient times\u2014with times which can never return, and heroes\nwhose form of life was different from all that the present condition of\nmankind requires or allows?\u201d\n\n\u201cTo know anything,\u201d returned the poet, \u201cwe must know its effects; to see\nmen, we must see their works, that we may learn what reason has dictated\nor passion has excited, and find what are the most powerful motives of\naction.  To judge rightly of the present, we must oppose it to the past;\nfor all judgment is comparative, and of the future nothing can be known.\nThe truth is that no mind is much employed upon the present; recollection\nand anticipation fill up almost all our moments.  Our passions are joy\nand grief, love and hatred, hope and fear.  Of joy and grief, the past is\nthe object, and the future of hope and fear; even love and hatred respect\nthe past, for the cause must have been before the effect.\n\n\u201cThe present state of things is the consequence of the former; and it is\nnatural to inquire what were the sources of the good that we enjoy, or\nthe evils that we suffer.  If we act only for ourselves, to neglect the\nstudy of history is not prudent.  If we are entrusted with the care of\nothers, it is not just.  Ignorance, when it is voluntary, is criminal;\nand he may properly be charged with evil who refused to learn how he\nmight prevent it.\n\n\u201cThere is no part of history so generally useful as that which relates to\nthe progress of the human mind, the gradual improvement of reason, the\nsuccessive advances of science, the vicissitudes of learning and\nignorance (which are the light and darkness of thinking beings), the\nextinction and resuscitation of arts, and the revolutions of the\nintellectual world.  If accounts of battles and invasions are peculiarly\nthe business of princes, the useful or elegant arts are not to be\nneglected; those who have kingdoms to govern have understandings to\ncultivate.\n\n\u201cExample is always more efficacious than precept.  A soldier is formed in\nwar, and a painter must copy pictures.  In this, contemplative life has\nthe advantage.  Great actions are seldom seen, but the labours of art are\nalways at hand for those who desire to know what art has been able to\nperform.\n\n\u201cWhen the eye or the imagination is struck with any uncommon work, the\nnext transition of an active mind is to the means by which it was\nperformed.  Here begins the true use of such contemplation.  We enlarge\nour comprehension by new ideas, and perhaps recover some art lost to\nmankind, or learn what is less perfectly known in our own country.  At\nleast we compare our own with former times, and either rejoice at our\nimprovements, or, what is the first motion towards good, discover our\ndefects.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am willing,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cto see all that can deserve my search.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cshall rejoice to learn something of the\nmanners of antiquity.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe most pompous monument of Egyptian greatness, and one of the most\nbulky works of manual industry,\u201d said Imlac, \u201care the Pyramids: fabrics\nraised before the time of history, and of which the earliest narratives\nafford us only uncertain traditions.  Of these the greatest is still\nstanding, very little injured by time.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us visit them to-morrow,\u201d said Nekayah.  \u201cI have often heard of the\nPyramids, and shall not rest till I have seen them, within and without,\nwith my own eyes.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\nTHEY VISIT THE PYRAMIDS.\n\n\nTHE resolution being thus taken, they set out the next day.  They laid\ntents upon their camels, being resolved to stay among the Pyramids till\ntheir curiosity was fully satisfied.  They travelled gently, turned aside\nto everything remarkable, stopped from time to time and conversed with\nthe inhabitants, and observed the various appearances of towns ruined and\ninhabited, of wild and cultivated nature.\n\nWhen they came to the Great Pyramid they were astonished at the extent of\nthe base and the height of the top.  Imlac explained to them the\nprinciples upon which the pyramidal form was chosen for a fabric intended\nto co-extend its duration with that of the world: he showed that its\ngradual diminution gave it such stability as defeated all the common\nattacks of the elements, and could scarcely be overthrown by earthquakes\nthemselves, the least resistible of natural violence.  A concussion that\nshould shatter the pyramid would threaten the dissolution of the\ncontinent.\n\nThey measured all its dimensions, and pitched their tents at its foot.\nNext day they prepared to enter its interior apartments, and having hired\nthe common guides, climbed up to the first passage; when the favourite of\nthe Princess, looking into the cavity, stepped back and trembled.\n\u201cPekuah,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cof what art thou afraid?\u201d\n\n\u201cOf the narrow entrance,\u201d answered the lady, \u201cand of the dreadful gloom.\nI dare not enter a place which must surely be inhabited by unquiet souls.\nThe original possessors of these dreadful vaults will start up before us,\nand perhaps shut us in for ever.\u201d  She spoke, and threw her arms round\nthe neck of her mistress.\n\n\u201cIf all your fear be of apparitions,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cI will promise\nyou safety.  There is no danger from the dead: he that is once buried\nwill be seen no more.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat the dead are seen no more,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cI will not undertake to\nmaintain against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages and of\nall nations.  There is no people, rude or learned, among whom apparitions\nof the dead are not related and believed.  This opinion, which perhaps\nprevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only\nby its truth: those that never heard of one another would not have agreed\nin a tale which nothing but experience can make credible.  That it is\ndoubted by single cavillers can very little weaken the general evidence,\nand some who deny it with their tongues confess it by their fears.\n\n\u201cYet I do not mean to add new terrors to those which have already seized\nupon Pekuah.  There can be no reason why spectres should haunt the\nPyramid more than other places, or why they should have power or will to\nhurt innocence and purity.  Our entrance is no violation of their\nprivileges: we can take nothing from them; how, then, can we offend\nthem?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear Pekuah,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cI will always go before you, and\nImlac shall follow you.  Remember that you are the companion of the\nPrincess of Abyssinia.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf the Princess is pleased that her servant should die,\u201d returned the\nlady, \u201clet her command some death less dreadful than enclosure in this\nhorrid cavern.  You know I dare not disobey you\u2014I must go if you command\nme; but if I once enter, I never shall come back.\u201d\n\nThe Princess saw that her fear was too strong for expostulation or\nreproof, and, embracing her, told her that she should stay in the tent\ntill their return.  Pekuah was not yet satisfied, but entreated the\nPrincess not to pursue so dreadful a purpose as that of entering the\nrecesses of the Pyramids.  \u201cThough I cannot teach courage,\u201d said Nekayah,\n\u201cI must not learn cowardice, nor leave at last undone what I came hither\nonly to do.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII\nTHEY ENTER THE PYRAMID.\n\n\nPEKUAH descended to the tents, and the rest entered the Pyramid.  They\npassed through the galleries, surveyed the vaults of marble, and examined\nthe chest in which the body of the founder is supposed to have been\ndeposited.  They then sat down in one of the most spacious chambers to\nrest awhile before they attempted to return.\n\n\u201cWe have now,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cgratified our minds with an exact view of the\ngreatest work of man, except the wall of China.\n\n\u201cOf the wall it is very easy to assign the motive.  It secured a wealthy\nand timorous nation from the incursions of barbarians, whose\nunskilfulness in the arts made it easier for them to supply their wants\nby rapine than by industry, and who from time to time poured in upon the\ninhabitants of peaceful commerce as vultures descend upon domestic fowl.\nTheir celerity and fierceness made the wall necessary, and their\nignorance made it efficacious.\n\n\u201cBut for the Pyramids, no reason has ever been given adequate to the cost\nand labour of the work.  The narrowness of the chambers proves that it\ncould afford no retreat from enemies, and treasures might have been\nreposited at far less expense with equal security.  It seems to have been\nerected only in compliance with that hunger of imagination which preys\nincessantly upon life, and must be always appeased by some employment.\nThose who have already all that they can enjoy must enlarge their\ndesires.  He that has built for use till use is supplied must begin to\nbuild for vanity, and extend his plan to the utmost power of human\nperformance that he may not be soon reduced to form another wish.\n\n\u201cI consider this mighty structure as a monument of the insufficiency of\nhuman enjoyments.  A king whose power is unlimited, and whose treasures\nsurmount all real and imaginary wants, is compelled to solace, by the\nerection of a pyramid, the satiety of dominion and tastelessness of\npleasures, and to amuse the tediousness of declining life by seeing\nthousands labouring without end, and one stone, for no purpose, laid upon\nanother.  Whoever thou art that, not content with a moderate condition,\nimaginest happiness in royal magnificence, and dreamest that command or\nriches can feed the appetite of novelty with perpetual gratifications,\nsurvey the Pyramids, and confess thy folly!\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIII\nTHE PRINCESS MEETS WITH AN UNEXPECTED MISFORTUNE.\n\n\nTHEY rose up, and returned through the cavity at which they had entered;\nand the Princess prepared for her favourite a long narrative of dark\nlabyrinths and costly rooms, and of the different impressions which the\nvarieties of the way had made upon her.  But when they came to their\ntrain, they found every one silent and dejected: the men discovered shame\nand fear in their countenances, and the women were weeping in their\ntents.\n\nWhat had happened they did not try to conjecture, but immediately\ninquired.  \u201cYou had scarcely entered into the Pyramid,\u201d said one of the\nattendants, \u201cwhen a troop of Arabs rushed upon us: we were too few to\nresist them, and too slow to escape.  They were about to search the\ntents, set us on our camels, and drive us along before them, when the\napproach of some Turkish horsemen put them to flight: but they seized the\nLady Pekuah with her two maids, and carried them away: the Turks are now\npursuing them by our instigation, but I fear they will not be able to\novertake them.\u201d\n\nThe Princess was overpowered with surprise and grief.  Rasselas, in the\nfirst heat of his resentment, ordered his servants to follow him, and\nprepared to pursue the robbers with his sabre in his hand.  \u201cSir,\u201d said\nImlac, \u201cwhat can you hope from violence or valour?  The Arabs are mounted\non horses trained to battle and retreat; we have only beasts of burden.\nBy leaving our present station we may lose the Princess, but cannot hope\nto regain Pekuah.\u201d\n\nIn a short time the Turks returned, having not been able to reach the\nenemy.  The Princess burst out into new lamentations, and Rasselas could\nscarcely forbear to reproach them with cowardice; but Imlac was of\nopinion that the escape of the Arabs was no addition to their misfortune,\nfor perhaps they would have killed their captives rather than have\nresigned them.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIV\nTHEY RETURN TO CAIRO WITHOUT PEKUAH.\n\n\nTHERE was nothing to be hoped from longer stay.  They returned to Cairo,\nrepenting of their curiosity, censuring the negligence of the government,\nlamenting their own rashness, which had neglected to procure a guard,\nimagining many expedients by which the loss of Pekuah might have been\nprevented, and resolving to do something for her recovery, though none\ncould find anything proper to be done.\n\nNekayah retired to her chamber, where her women attempted to comfort her\nby telling her that all had their troubles, and that Lady Pekuah had\nenjoyed much happiness in the world for a long time, and might reasonably\nexpect a change of fortune.  They hoped that some good would befall her\nwheresoever she was, and that their mistress would find another friend\nwho might supply her place.\n\nThe Princess made them no answer; and they continued the form of\ncondolence, not much grieved in their hearts that the favourite was lost.\n\nNext day the Prince presented to the Bassa a memorial of the wrong which\nhe had suffered, and a petition for redress.  The Bassa threatened to\npunish the robbers, but did not attempt to catch them; nor indeed could\nany account or description be given by which he might direct the pursuit.\n\nIt soon appeared that nothing would be done by authority.  Governors\nbeing accustomed to hear of more crimes than they can punish, and more\nwrongs than they can redress, set themselves at ease by indiscriminate\nnegligence, and presently forget the request when they lose sight of the\npetitioner.\n\nImlac then endeavoured to gain some intelligence by private agents.  He\nfound many who pretended to an exact knowledge of all the haunts of the\nArabs, and to regular correspondence with their chiefs, and who readily\nundertook the recovery of Pekuah.  Of these, some were furnished with\nmoney for their journey, and came back no more; some were liberally paid\nfor accounts which a few days discovered to be false.  But the Princess\nwould not suffer any means, however improbable, to be left untried.\nWhile she was doing something, she kept her hope alive.  As one expedient\nfailed, another was suggested; when one messenger returned unsuccessful,\nanother was despatched to a different quarter.\n\nTwo months had now passed, and of Pekuah nothing had been heard; the\nhopes which they had endeavoured to raise in each other grew more\nlanguid; and the Princess, when she saw nothing more to be tried, sunk\ndown inconsolable in hopeless dejection.  A thousand times she reproached\nherself with the easy compliance by which she permitted her favourite to\nstay behind her.  \u201cHad not my fondness,\u201d said she, \u201clessened my\nauthority, Pekuah had not dared to talk of her terrors.  She ought to\nhave feared me more than spectres.  A severe look would have overpowered\nher; a peremptory command would have compelled obedience.  Why did\nfoolish indulgence prevail upon me?  Why did I not speak, and refuse to\nhear?\u201d\n\n\u201cGreat Princess,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cdo not reproach yourself for your virtue,\nor consider that as blameable by which evil has accidentally been caused.\nYour tenderness for the timidity of Pekuah was generous and kind.  When\nwe act according to our duty, we commit the events to Him by whose laws\nour actions are governed, and who will suffer none to be finally punished\nfor obedience.  When, in prospect of some good, whether natural or moral,\nwe break the rules prescribed us, we withdraw from the direction of\nsuperior wisdom, and take all consequences upon ourselves.  Man cannot so\nfar know the connection of causes and events as that he may venture to do\nwrong in order to do right.  When we pursue our end by lawful means, we\nmay always console our miscarriage by the hope of future recompense.\nWhen we consult only our own policy, and attempt to find a nearer way to\ngood by over-leaping the settled boundaries of right and wrong, we cannot\nbe happy even by success, because we cannot escape the consciousness of\nour fault; but if we miscarry, the disappointment is irremediably\nembittered.  How comfortless is the sorrow of him who feels at once the\npangs of guilt and the vexation of calamity which guilt has brought upon\nhim!\n\n\u201cConsider, Princess, what would have been your condition if the Lady\nPekuah had entreated to accompany you, and, being compelled to stay in\nthe tents, had been carried away; or how would you have borne the thought\nif you had forced her into the Pyramid, and she had died before you in\nagonies of terror?\u201d\n\n\u201cHad either happened,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cI could not have endured life till\nnow; I should have been tortured to madness by the remembrance of such\ncruelty, or must have pined away in abhorrence of myself.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis, at least,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis the present reward of virtuous conduct,\nthat no unlucky consequence can oblige us to repent it.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXV\nTHE PRINCESS LANGUISHES FOR WANT OF PEKUAH.\n\n\nNEKAYAH, being thus reconciled to herself, found that no evil is\ninsupportable but that which is accompanied with consciousness of wrong.\nShe was from that time delivered from the violence of tempestuous sorrow,\nand sunk into silent pensiveness and gloomy tranquillity.  She sat from\nmorning to evening recollecting all that had been done or said by her\nPekuah, treasured up with care every trifle on which Pekuah had set an\naccidental value, and which might recall to mind any little incident or\ncareless conversation.  The sentiments of her whom she now expected to\nsee no more were treasured in her memory as rules of life, and she\ndeliberated to no other end than to conjecture on any occasion what would\nhave been the opinion and counsel of Pekuah.\n\nThe women by whom she was attended knew nothing of her real condition,\nand therefore she could not talk to them but with caution and reserve.\nShe began to remit her curiosity, having no great desire to collect\nnotions which she had no convenience of uttering.  Rasselas endeavoured\nfirst to comfort and afterwards to divert her; he hired musicians, to\nwhom she seemed to listen, but did not hear them; and procured masters to\ninstruct her in various arts, whose lectures, when they visited her\nagain, were again to be repeated.  She had lost her taste of pleasure and\nher ambition of excellence; and her mind, though forced into short\nexcursions, always recurred to the image of her friend.\n\nImlac was every morning earnestly enjoined to renew his inquiries, and\nwas asked every night whether he had yet heard of Pekuah; till, not being\nable to return the Princess the answer that she desired, he was less and\nless willing to come into her presence.  She observed his backwardness,\nand commanded him to attend her.   \u201cYou are not,\u201d said she, \u201cto confound\nimpatience with resentment, or to suppose that I charge you with\nnegligence because I repine at your unsuccessfulness.  I do not much\nwonder at your absence.  I know that the unhappy are never pleasing, and\nthat all naturally avoid the contagion of misery.  To hear complaints is\nwearisome alike to the wretched and the happy; for who would cloud by\nadventitious grief the short gleams of gaiety which life allows us, or\nwho that is struggling under his own evils will add to them the miseries\nof another?\n\n\u201cThe time is at hand when none shall be disturbed any longer by the sighs\nof Nekayah: my search after happiness is now at an end.  I am resolved to\nretire from the world, with all its flatteries and deceits, and will hide\nmyself in solitude, without any other care than to compose my thoughts\nand regulate my hours by a constant succession of innocent occupations,\ntill, with a mind purified from earthly desires, I shall enter into that\nstate to which all are hastening, and in which I hope again to enjoy the\nfriendship of Pekuah.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not entangle your mind,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cby irrevocable determinations,\nnor increase the burden of life by a voluntary accumulation of misery.\nThe weariness of retirement will continue to increase when the loss of\nPekuah is forgot.  That you have been deprived of one pleasure is no very\ngood reason for rejection of the rest.\u201d\n\n\u201cSince Pekuah was taken from me,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cI have no pleasure\nto reject or to retain.  She that has no one to love or trust has little\nto hope.  She wants the radical principle of happiness.  We may perhaps\nallow that what satisfaction this world can afford must arise from the\nconjunction of wealth, knowledge, and goodness.  Wealth is nothing but as\nit is bestowed, and knowledge nothing but as it is communicated.  They\nmust therefore be imparted to others, and to whom could I now delight to\nimpart them?  Goodness affords the only comfort which can be enjoyed\nwithout a partner, and goodness may be practised in retirement.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow far solitude may admit goodness or advance it, I shall not,\u201d replied\nImlac, \u201cdispute at present.  Remember the confession of the pious hermit.\nYou will wish to return into the world when the image of your companion\nhas left your thoughts.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat time,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cwill never come.  The generous frankness, the\nmodest obsequiousness, and the faithful secrecy of my dear Pekuah will\nalways be more missed as I shall live longer to see vice and folly.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe state of a mind oppressed with a sudden calamity,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis\nlike that of the fabulous inhabitants of the new-created earth, who, when\nthe first night came upon them, supposed that day would never return.\nWhen the clouds of sorrow gather over us, we see nothing beyond them, nor\ncan imagine how they will be dispelled; yet a new day succeeded to the\nnight, and sorrow is never long without a dawn of ease.  But they who\nrestrain themselves from receiving comfort do as the savages would have\ndone had they put out their eyes when it was dark.  Our minds, like our\nbodies, are in continual flux; something is hourly lost, and something\nacquired.  To lose much at once is inconvenient to either, but while the\nvital power remains uninjured, nature will find the means of reparation.\nDistance has the same effect on the mind as on the eye; and while we\nglide along the stream of time, whatever we leave behind us is always\nlessening, and that which we approach increasing in magnitude.  Do not\nsuffer life to stagnate: it will grow muddy for want of motion; commit\nyourself again to the current of the world; Pekuah will vanish by\ndegrees; you will meet in your way some other favourite, or learn to\ndiffuse yourself in general conversation.\u201d\n\n\u201cAt least,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cdo not despair before all remedies have\nbeen tried.  The inquiry after the unfortunate lady is still continued,\nand shall be carried on with yet greater diligence, on condition that you\nwill promise to wait a year for the event, without any unalterable\nresolution.\u201d\n\nNekayah thought this a reasonable demand, and made the promise to her\nbrother, who had been obliged by Imlac to require it.  Imlac had, indeed,\nno great hope of regaining Pekuah; but he supposed that if he could\nsecure the interval of a year, the Princess would be then in no danger of\na cloister.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVI\nPEKUAH IS STILL REMEMBERED.  THE PROGRESS OF SORROW.\n\n\nNEKAYAH, seeing that nothing was omitted for the recovery of her\nfavourite, and having by her promise set her intention of retirement at a\ndistance, began imperceptibly to return to common cares and common\npleasures.  She rejoiced without her own consent at the suspension of her\nsorrows, and sometimes caught herself with indignation in the act of\nturning away her mind from the remembrance of her whom yet she resolved\nnever to forget.\n\nShe then appointed a certain hour of the day for meditation on the merits\nand fondness of Pekuah, and for some weeks retired constantly at the time\nfixed, and returned with her eyes swollen and her countenance clouded.\nBy degrees she grew less scrupulous, and suffered any important and\npressing avocation to delay the tribute of daily tears.  She then yielded\nto less occasions, and sometimes forgot what she was indeed afraid to\nremember, and at last wholly released herself from the duty of periodical\naffliction.\n\nHer real love of Pekuah was not yet diminished.  A thousand occurrences\nbrought her back to memory, and a thousand wants, which nothing but the\nconfidence of friendship can supply, made her frequently regretted.  She\ntherefore solicited Imlac never to desist from inquiry, and to leave no\nart of intelligence untried, that at least she might have the comfort of\nknowing that she did not suffer by negligence or sluggishness.  \u201cYet\nwhat,\u201d said she, \u201cis to be expected from our pursuit of happiness, when\nwe find the state of life to be such that happiness itself is the cause\nof misery?  Why should we endeavour to attain that of which the\npossession cannot be secured?  I shall henceforward fear to yield my\nheart to excellence, however bright, or to fondness, however tender, lest\nI should lose again what I have lost in Pekuah.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVII\nTHE PRINCESS HEARS NEWS OF PEKUAH.\n\n\nIN seven mouths one of the messengers who had been sent away upon the day\nwhen the promise was drawn from the Princess, returned, after many\nunsuccessful rambles, from the borders of Nubia, with an account that\nPekuah was in the hands of an Arab chief, who possessed a castle or\nfortress on the extremity of Egypt.  The Arab, whose revenue was plunder,\nwas willing to restore her, with her two attendants, for two hundred\nounces of gold.\n\nThe price was no subject of debate.  The Princess was in ecstasies when\nshe heard that her favourite was alive, and might so cheaply be ransomed.\nShe could not think of delaying for a moment Pekuah\u2019s happiness or her\nown, but entreated her brother to send back the messenger with the sum\nrequired.  Imlac, being consulted, was not very confident of the veracity\nof the relater, and was still more doubtful of the Arab\u2019s faith, who\nmight, if he were too liberally trusted, detain at once the money and the\ncaptives.  He thought it dangerous to put themselves in the power of the\nArab by going into his district; and could not expect that the rover\nwould so much expose himself as to come into the lower country, where he\nmight be seized by the forces of the Bassa.\n\nIt is difficult to negotiate where neither will trust.  But Imlac, after\nsome deliberation, directed the messenger to propose that Pekuah should\nbe conducted by ten horsemen to the monastery of St. Anthony, which is\nsituated in the deserts of Upper Egypt, where she should be met by the\nsame number, and her ransom should be paid.\n\nThat no time might be lost, as they expected that the proposal would not\nbe refused, they immediately began their journey to the monastery; and\nwhen they arrived, Imlac went forward with the former messenger to the\nArab\u2019s fortress.  Rasselas was desirous to go with them; but neither his\nsister nor Imlac would consent.  The Arab, according to the custom of his\nnation, observed the laws of hospitality with great exactness to those\nwho put themselves into his power, and in a few days brought Pekuah, with\nher maids, by easy journeys, to the place appointed, where, receiving the\nstipulated price, he restored her, with great respect, to liberty and her\nfriends, and undertook to conduct them back towards Cairo beyond all\ndanger of robbery or violence.\n\nThe Princess and her favourite embraced each other with transport too\nviolent to be expressed, and went out together to pour the tears of\ntenderness in secret, and exchange professions of kindness and gratitude.\nAfter a few hours they returned into the refectory of the convent, where,\nin the presence of the prior and his brethren, the Prince required of\nPekuah the history of her adventures.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVIII\nTHE ADVENTURES OF THE LADY PEKUAH.\n\n\n\u201cAT what time and in what manner I was forced away,\u201d said Pekuah, \u201cyour\nservants have told you.  The suddenness of the event struck me with\nsurprise, and I was at first rather stupefied than agitated with any\npassion of either fear or sorrow.  My confusion was increased by the\nspeed and tumult of our flight, while we were followed by the Turks, who,\nas it seemed, soon despaired to overtake us, or were afraid of those whom\nthey made a show of menacing.\n\n\u201cWhen the Arabs saw themselves out of danger, they slackened their\ncourse; and as I was less harassed by external violence, I began to feel\nmore uneasiness in my mind.  After some time we stopped near a spring\nshaded with trees, in a pleasant meadow, where we were set upon the\nground, and offered such refreshments as our masters were partaking.  I\nwas suffered to sit with my maids apart from the rest, and none attempted\nto comfort or insult us.  Here I first began to feel the full weight of\nmy misery.  The girls sat weeping in silence, and from time to time\nlooked on me for succour.  I knew not to what condition we were doomed,\nnor could conjecture where would be the place of our captivity, or whence\nto draw any hope of deliverance.  I was in the hands of robbers and\nsavages, and had no reason to suppose that their pity was more than their\njustice, or that they would forbear the gratification of any ardour of\ndesire or caprice of cruelty.  I, however, kissed my maids, and\nendeavoured to pacify them by remarking that we were yet treated with\ndecency, and that since we were now carried beyond pursuit, there was no\ndanger of violence to our lives.\n\n\u201cWhen we were to be set again on horseback, my maids clung round me, and\nrefused to be parted; but I commanded them not to irritate those who had\nus in their power.  We travelled the remaining part of the day through an\nunfrequented and pathless country, and came by moonlight to the side of a\nhill, where the rest of the troop was stationed.  Their tents were\npitched and their fires kindled, and our chief was welcomed as a man much\nbeloved by his dependents.\n\n\u201cWe were received into a large tent, where we found women who had\nattended their husbands in the expedition.  They set before us the supper\nwhich they had provided, and I ate it rather to encourage my maids than\nto comply with any appetite of my own.  When the meat was taken away,\nthey spread the carpets for repose.  I was weary, and hoped to find in\nsleep that remission of distress which nature seldom denies.  Ordering\nmyself, therefore, to be undressed, I observed that the women looked very\nearnestly upon me, not expecting, I suppose, to see me so submissively\nattended.  When my upper vest was taken off, they were apparently struck\nwith the splendour of my clothes, and one of them timorously laid her\nhand upon the embroidery.  She then went out, and in a short time came\nback with another woman, who seemed to be of higher rank and greater\nauthority.  She did, at her entrance, the usual act of reverence, and,\ntaking me by the hand placed me in a smaller tent, spread with finer\ncarpets, where I spent the night quietly with my maids.\n\n\u201cIn the morning, as I was sitting on the grass, the chief of the troop\ncame towards me.  I rose up to receive him, and he bowed with great\nrespect.  \u2018Illustrious lady,\u2019 said he, \u2018my fortune is better than I had\npresumed to hope: I am told by my women that I have a princess in my\ncamp.\u2019  \u2018Sir,\u2019 answered I, \u2018your women have deceived themselves and you;\nI am not a princess, but an unhappy stranger who intended soon to have\nleft this country, in which I am now to be imprisoned for ever.\u2019\n\u2018Whoever or whencesoever you are,\u2019 returned the Arab, \u2018your dress and\nthat of your servants show your rank to be high and your wealth to be\ngreat.  Why should you, who can so easily procure your ransom, think\nyourself in danger of perpetual captivity?  The purpose of my incursions\nis to increase my riches, or, more properly, to gather tribute.  The sons\nof Ishmael are the natural and hereditary lords of this part of the\ncontinent, which is usurped by late invaders and low-born tyrants, from\nwhom we are compelled to take by the sword what is denied to justice.\nThe violence of war admits no distinction: the lance that is lifted at\nguilt and power will sometimes fall on innocence and gentleness.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018How little,\u2019 said I, \u2018did I expect that yesterday it should have fallen\nupon me!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2019Misfortunes,\u2019 answered the Arab, \u2018should always be expected.  If the\neye of hostility could learn reverence or pity, excellence like yours had\nbeen exempt from injury.  But the angels of affliction spread their toils\nalike for the virtuous and the wicked, for the mighty and the mean.  Do\nnot be disconsolate; I am not one of the lawless and cruel rovers of the\ndesert; I know the rules of civil life; I will fix your ransom, give a\npassport to your messenger, and perform my stipulation with nice\npunctuality.\u2019\n\n\u201cYou will easily believe that I was pleased with his courtesy, and\nfinding that his predominant passion was desire for money, I began now to\nthink my danger less, for I knew that no sum would be thought too great\nfor the release of Pekuah.  I told him that he should have no reason to\ncharge me with ingratitude if I was used with kindness, and that any\nransom which could be expected for a maid of common rank would be paid,\nbut that he must not persist to rate me as a princess.  He said he would\nconsider what he should demand, and then, smiling, bowed and retired.\n\n\u201cSoon after the women came about me, each contending to be more officious\nthan the other, and my maids themselves were served with reverence.  We\ntravelled onward by short journeys.  On the fourth day the chief told me\nthat my ransom must be two hundred ounces of gold, which I not only\npromised him, but told him that I would add fifty more if I and my maids\nwere honourably treated.\n\n\u201cI never knew the power of gold before.  From that time I was the leader\nof the troop.  The march of every day was longer or shorter as I\ncommanded, and the tents were pitched where I chose to rest.  We now had\ncamels and other conveniences for travel; my own women were always at my\nside, and I amused myself with observing the manners of the vagrant\nnations, and with viewing remains of ancient edifices, with which these\ndeserted countries appear to have been in some distant age lavishly\nembellished.\n\n\u201cThe chief of the band was a man far from illiterate: he was able to\ntravel by the stars or the compass, and had marked in his erratic\nexpeditions such places as are most worthy the notice of a passenger.  He\nobserved to me that buildings are always best preserved in places little\nfrequented and difficult of access; for when once a country declines from\nits primitive splendour, the more inhabitants are left, the quicker ruin\nwill be made.  Walls supply stones more easily than quarries; and palaces\nand temples will be demolished to make stables of granite and cottages of\nporphyry.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIX\nTHE ADVENTURES OF PEKUAH (_continued_).\n\n\n\u201cWE wandered about in this manner for some weeks, either, as our chief\npretended, for my gratification, or, as I rather suspected, for some\nconvenience of his own.  I endeavoured to appear contented where\nsullenness and resentment would have been of no use, and that endeavour\nconduced much to the calmness of my mind; but my heart was always with\nNekayah, and the troubles of the night much overbalanced the amusements\nof the day.  My women, who threw all their cares upon their mistress, set\ntheir minds at ease from the time when they saw me treated with respect,\nand gave themselves up to the incidental alleviations of our fatigue\nwithout solicitude or sorrow.  I was pleased with their pleasure, and\nanimated with their confidence.  My condition had lost much of its\nterror, since I found that the Arab ranged the country merely to get\nriches.  Avarice is a uniform and tractable vice: other intellectual\ndistempers are different in different constitutions of mind; that which\nsoothes the pride of one will offend the pride of another; but to the\nfavour of the covetous there is a ready way\u2014bring money, and nothing is\ndenied.\n\n\u201cAt last we came to the dwelling of our chief; a strong and spacious\nhouse, built with stone in an island of the Nile, which lies, as I was\ntold, under the tropic.  \u2018Lady,\u2019 said the Arab, \u2018you shall rest after\nyour journey a few weeks in this place, where you are to consider\nyourself as Sovereign.  My occupation is war: I have therefore chosen\nthis obscure residence, from which I can issue unexpected, and to which I\ncan retire unpursued.  You may now repose in security: here are few\npleasures, but here is no danger.\u2019  He then led me into the inner\napartments, and seating me on the richest couch, bowed to the ground.\n\n\u201cHis women, who considered me as a rival, looked on me with malignity;\nbut being soon informed that I was a great lady detained only for my\nransom, they began to vie with each other in obsequiousness and\nreverence.\n\n\u201cBeing again comforted with new assurances of speedy liberty, I was for\nsome days diverted from impatience by the novelty of the place.  The\nturrets overlooked the country to a great distance, and afforded a view\nof many windings of the stream.  In the day I wandered from one place to\nanother, as the course of the sun varied the splendour of the prospect,\nand saw many things which I had never seen before.  The crocodiles and\nriver-horses are common in this unpeopled region; and I often looked upon\nthem with terror, though I knew they could not hurt me.  For some time I\nexpected to see mermaids and tritons, which, as Imlac has told me, the\nEuropean travellers have stationed in the Nile; but no such beings ever\nappeared, and the Arab, when I inquired after them, laughed at my\ncredulity.\n\n\u201cAt night the Arab always attended me to a tower set apart for celestial\nobservations, where he endeavoured to teach me the names and courses of\nthe stars.  I had no great inclination to this study; but an appearance\nof attention was necessary to please my instructor, who valued himself\nfor his skill, and in a little while I found some employment requisite to\nbeguile the tediousness of time, which was to be passed always amidst the\nsame objects.  I was weary of looking in the morning on things from which\nI had turned away weary in the evening: I therefore was at last willing\nto observe the stars rather than do nothing, but could not always compose\nmy thoughts, and was very often thinking on Nekayah when others imagined\nme contemplating the sky.  Soon after, the Arab went upon another\nexpedition, and then my only pleasure was to talk with my maids about the\naccident by which we were carried away, and the happiness we should all\nenjoy at the end of our captivity.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere were women in your Arab\u2019s fortress,\u201d said the Princess; \u201cwhy did\nyou not make them your companions, enjoy their conversation, and partake\ntheir diversions?  In a place where they found business or amusement, why\nshould you alone sit corroded with idle melancholy? or why could not you\nbear for a few months that condition to which they were condemned for\nlife?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe diversions of the women,\u201d answered Pekuah, \u201cwere only childish play,\nby which the mind accustomed to stronger operations could not be kept\nbusy.  I could do all which they delighted in doing by powers merely\nsensitive, while my intellectual faculties were flown to Cairo.  They ran\nfrom room to room, as a bird hops from wire to wire in his cage.  They\ndanced for the sake of motion, as lambs frisk in a meadow.  One sometimes\npretended to be hurt that the rest might be alarmed, or hid herself that\nanother might seek her.  Part of their time passed in watching the\nprogress of light bodies that floated on the river, and part in marking\nthe various forms into which clouds broke in the sky.\n\n\u201cTheir business was only needlework, in which I and my maids sometimes\nhelped them; but you know that the mind will easily straggle from the\nfingers, nor will you suspect that captivity and absence from Nekayah\ncould receive solace from silken flowers.\n\n\u201cNor was much satisfaction to be hoped from their conversation: for of\nwhat could they be expected to talk?  They had seen nothing, for they had\nlived from early youth in that narrow spot: of what they had not seen\nthey could have no knowledge, for they could not read.  They had no idea\nbut of the few things that were within their view, and had hardly names\nfor anything but their clothes and their food.  As I bore a superior\ncharacter, I was often called to terminate their quarrels, which I\ndecided as equitably as I could.  If it could have amused me to hear the\ncomplaints of each against the rest, I might have been often detained by\nlong stories; but the motives of their animosity were so small that I\ncould not listen without interrupting the tale.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201ccan the Arab, whom you represented as a man of\nmore than common accomplishments, take any pleasure in his seraglio, when\nit is filled only with women like these?  Are they exquisitely\nbeautiful?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey do not,\u201d said Pekuah, \u201cwant that unaffecting and ignoble beauty\nwhich may subsist without sprightliness or sublimity, without energy of\nthought or dignity of virtue.  But to a man like the Arab such beauty was\nonly a flower casually plucked and carelessly thrown away.  Whatever\npleasures he might find among them, they were not those of friendship or\nsociety.  When they were playing about him he looked on them with\ninattentive superiority; when they vied for his regard he sometimes\nturned away disgusted.  As they had no knowledge, their talk could take\nnothing from the tediousness of life; as they had no choice, their\nfondness, or appearance of fondness, excited in him neither pride nor\ngratitude.  He was not exalted in his own esteem by the smiles of a woman\nwho saw no other man, nor was much obliged by that regard of which he\ncould never know the sincerity, and which he might often perceive to be\nexerted not so much to delight him as to pain a rival.  That which he\ngave, and they received, as love, was only a careless distribution of\nsuperfluous time, such love as man can bestow upon that which he\ndespises, such as has neither hope nor fear, neither joy nor sorrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have reason, lady, to think yourself happy,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cthat you\nhave been thus easily dismissed.  How could a mind, hungry for knowledge,\nbe willing, in an intellectual famine, to lose such a banquet as Pekuah\u2019s\nconversation?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am inclined to believe,\u201d answered Pekuah, \u201cthat he was for some time\nin suspense; for, notwithstanding his promise, whenever I proposed to\ndespatch a messenger to Cairo he found some excuse for delay.  While I\nwas detained in his house he made many incursions into the neighbouring\ncountries, and perhaps he would have refused to discharge me had his\nplunder been equal to his wishes.  He returned always courteous, related\nhis adventures, delighted to hear my observations, and endeavoured to\nadvance my acquaintance with the stars.  When I importuned him to send\naway my letters, he soothed me with professions of honour and sincerity;\nand when I could be no longer decently denied, put his troop again in\nmotion, and left me to govern in his absence.  I was much afflicted by\nthis studied procrastination, and was sometimes afraid that I should be\nforgotten; that you would leave Cairo, and I must end my days in an\nisland of the Nile.\n\n\u201cI grew at last hopeless and dejected, and cared so little to entertain\nhim, that he for a while more frequently talked with my maids.  That he\nshould fall in love with them or with me, might have been equally fatal,\nand I was not much pleased with the growing friendship.  My anxiety was\nnot long, for, as I recovered some degree of cheerfulness, he returned to\nme, and I could not forbear to despise my former uneasiness.\n\n\u201cHe still delayed to send for my ransom, and would perhaps never have\ndetermined had not your agent found his way to him.  The gold, which he\nwould not fetch, he could not reject when it was offered.  He hastened to\nprepare for our journey hither, like a man delivered from the pain of an\nintestine conflict.  I took leave of my companions in the house, who\ndismissed me with cold indifference.\u201d\n\nNekayah having heard her favourite\u2019s relation, rose and embraced her, and\nRasselas gave her a hundred ounces of gold, which she presented to the\nArab for the fifty that were promised.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XL\nTHE HISTORY OF A MAN OF LEARNING.\n\n\nTHEY returned to Cairo, and were so well pleased at finding themselves\ntogether that none of them went much abroad.  The Prince began to love\nlearning, and one day declared to Imlac that he intended to devote\nhimself to science and pass the rest of his days in literary solitude.\n\n\u201cBefore you make your final choice,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201cyou ought to\nexamine its hazards, and converse with some of those who are grown old in\nthe company of themselves.  I have just left the observatory of one of\nthe most learned astronomers in the world, who has spent forty years in\nunwearied attention to the motion and appearances of the celestial\nbodies, and has drawn out his soul in endless calculations.  He admits a\nfew friends once a month to hear his deductions and enjoy his\ndiscoveries.  I was introduced as a man of knowledge worthy of his\nnotice.  Men of various ideas and fluent conversation are commonly\nwelcome to those whose thoughts have been long fixed upon a single point,\nand who find the images of other things stealing away.  I delighted him\nwith my remarks.  He smiled at the narrative of my travels, and was glad\nto forget the constellations and descend for a moment into the lower\nworld.\n\n\u201cOn the next day of vacation I renewed my visit, and was so fortunate as\nto please him again.  He relaxed from that time the severity of his rule,\nand permitted me to enter at my own choice.  I found him always busy, and\nalways glad to be relieved.  As each knew much which the other was\ndesirous of learning, we exchanged our notions with great delight.  I\nperceived that I had every day more of his confidence, and always found\nnew cause of admiration in the profundity of his mind.  His comprehension\nis vast, his memory capacious and retentive, his discourse is methodical,\nand his expression clear.\n\n\u201cHis integrity and benevolence are equal to his learning.  His deepest\nresearches and most favourite studies are willingly interrupted for any\nopportunity of doing good by his counsel or his riches.  To his closest\nretreat, at his most busy moments, all are admitted that want his\nassistance; \u2018For though I exclude idleness and pleasure, I will never,\u2019\nsays he, \u2018bar my doors against charity.  To man is permitted the\ncontemplation of the skies, but the practice of virtue is commanded.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cthis man is happy.\u201d\n\n\u201cI visited him,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cwith more and more frequency, and was every\ntime more enamoured of his conversation; he was sublime without\nhaughtiness, courteous without formality, and communicative without\nostentation.  I was at first, great Princess, of your opinion, thought\nhim the happiest of mankind, and often congratulated him on the blessing\nthat he enjoyed.  He seemed to hear nothing with indifference but the\npraises of his condition, to which he always returned a general answer,\nand diverted the conversation to some other topic.\n\n\u201cAmidst this willingness to be pleased and labour to please, I had\nquickly reason to imagine that some painful sentiment pressed upon his\nmind.  He often looked up earnestly towards the sun, and let his voice\nfall in the midst of his discourse.  He would sometimes, when we were\nalone, gaze upon me in silence with the air of a man who longed to speak\nwhat he was yet resolved to suppress.  He would often send for me with\nvehement injunction of haste, though when I came to him he had nothing\nextraordinary to say; and sometimes, when I was leaving him, would call\nme back, pause a few moments, and then dismiss me.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLI\nTHE ASTRONOMER DISCOVERS THE CAUSE OF HIS UNEASINESS.\n\n\n\u201cAT last the time came when the secret burst his reserve.  We were\nsitting together last night in the turret of his house watching the\nimmersion of a satellite of Jupiter.  A sudden tempest clouded the sky\nand disappointed our observation.  We sat awhile silent in the dark, and\nthen he addressed himself to me in these words: \u2018Imlac, I have long\nconsidered thy friendship as the greatest blessing of my life.  Integrity\nwithout knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is\ndangerous and dreadful.  I have found in thee all the qualities requisite\nfor trust\u2014benevolence, experience, and fortitude.  I have long discharged\nan office which I must soon quit at the call of Nature, and shall rejoice\nin the hour of imbecility and pain to devolve it upon thee.\u2019\n\n\u201cI thought myself honoured by this testimony, and protested that whatever\ncould conduce to his happiness would add likewise to mine.\n\n\u201c\u2018Hear, Imlac, what thou wilt not without difficulty credit.  I have\npossessed for five years the regulation of the weather and the\ndistribution of the seasons.  The sun has listened to my dictates, and\npassed from tropic to tropic by my direction; the clouds at my call have\npoured their waters, and the Nile has overflowed at my command.  I have\nrestrained the rage of the dog-star, and mitigated the fervours of the\ncrab.  The winds alone, of all the elemental powers, have hitherto\nrefused my authority, and multitudes have perished by equinoctial\ntempests which I found myself unable to prohibit or restrain.  I have\nadministered this great office with exact justice, and made to the\ndifferent nations of the earth an impartial dividend of rain and\nsunshine.  What must have been the misery of half the globe if I had\nlimited the clouds to particular regions, or confined the sun to either\nside of the equator?\u2019\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLII\nTHE OPINION OF THE ASTRONOMER IS EXPLAINED AND JUSTIFIED.\n\n\n\u201cI SUPPOSE he discovered in me, through the obscurity of the room, some\ntokens of amazement and doubt, for after a short pause he proceeded\nthus:\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Not to be easily credited will neither surprise nor offend me, for I am\nprobably the first of human beings to whom this trust has been imparted.\nNor do I know whether to deem this distinction a reward or punishment.\nSince I have possessed it I have been far less happy than before, and\nnothing but the consciousness of good intention could have enabled me to\nsupport the weariness of unremitted vigilance.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018How long, sir,\u2019 said I, \u2018has this great office been in your hands?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018About ten years ago,\u2019 said he, \u2018my daily observations of the changes of\nthe sky led me to consider whether, if I had the power of the seasons, I\ncould confer greater plenty upon the inhabitants of the earth.  This\ncontemplation fastened on my mind, and I sat days and nights in imaginary\ndominion, pouring upon this country and that the showers of fertility,\nand seconding every fall of rain with a due proportion of sunshine.  I\nhad yet only the will to do good, and did not imagine that I should ever\nhave the power.\n\n\u201c\u2018One day as I was looking on the fields withering with heat, I felt in\nmy mind a sudden wish that I could send rain on the southern mountains,\nand raise the Nile to an inundation.  In the hurry of my imagination I\ncommanded rain to fall; and by comparing the time of my command with that\nof the inundation, I found that the clouds had listened to my lips.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Might not some other cause,\u2019 said I, \u2018produce this concurrence?  The\nNile does not always rise on the same day.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Do not believe,\u2019 said he, with impatience, \u2018that such objections could\nescape me.  I reasoned long against my own conviction, and laboured\nagainst truth with the utmost obstinacy.  I sometimes suspected myself of\nmadness, and should not have dared to impart this secret but to a man\nlike you, capable of distinguishing the wonderful from the impossible,\nand the incredible from the false.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Why, sir,\u2019 said I, \u2018do you call that incredible which you know, or\nthink you know, to be true?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Because,\u2019 said he, \u2018I cannot prove it by any external evidence; and I\nknow too well the laws of demonstration to think that my conviction ought\nto influence another, who cannot, like me, be conscious of its force.  I\ntherefore shall not attempt to gain credit by disputation.  It is\nsufficient that I feel this power that I have long possessed, and every\nday exerted it.  But the life of man is short; the infirmities of age\nincrease upon me, and the time will soon come when the regulator of the\nyear must mingle with the dust.  The care of appointing a successor has\nlong disturbed me; the night and the day have been spent in comparisons\nof all the characters which have come to my knowledge, and I have yet\nfound none so worthy as thyself.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIII\nTHE ASTRONOMER LEAVES IMLAC HIS DIRECTIONS.\n\n\n\u201c\u2018HEAR, therefore, what I shall impart with attention, such as the\nwelfare of a world requires.  If the task of a king be considered as\ndifficult, who has the care only of a few millions, to whom he cannot do\nmuch good or harm, what must be the anxiety of him on whom depends the\naction of the elements and the great gifts of light and heat?  Hear me,\ntherefore, with attention.\n\n\u201c\u2018I have diligently considered the position of the earth and sun, and\nformed innumerable schemes, in which I changed their situation.  I have\nsometimes turned aside the axis of the earth, and sometimes varied the\necliptic of the sun, but I have found it impossible to make a disposition\nby which the world may be advantaged; what one region gains another loses\nby an imaginable alteration, even without considering the distant parts\nof the solar system with which we are acquainted.  Do not, therefore, in\nthy administration of the year, indulge thy pride by innovation; do not\nplease thyself with thinking that thou canst make thyself renowned to all\nfuture ages by disordering the seasons.  The memory of mischief is no\ndesirable fame.  Much less will it become thee to let kindness or\ninterest prevail.  Never rob other countries of rain to pour it on thine\nown.  For us the Nile is sufficient.\u2019\n\n\u201cI promised that when I possessed the power I would use it with\ninflexible integrity; and he dismissed me, pressing my hand.  \u2018My heart,\u2019\nsaid he, \u2018will be now at rest, and my benevolence will no more destroy my\nquiet; I have found a man of wisdom and virtue, to whom I can cheerfully\nbequeath the inheritance of the sun.\u2019\u201d\n\nThe Prince heard this narration with very serious regard; but the\nPrincess smiled, and Pekuah convulsed herself with laughter.  \u201cLadies,\u201d\nsaid Imlac, \u201cto mock the heaviest of human afflictions is neither\ncharitable nor wise.  Few can attain this man\u2019s knowledge and few\npractise his virtues, but all may suffer his calamity.  Of the\nuncertainties of our present state, the most dreadful and alarming is the\nuncertain continuance of reason.\u201d\n\nThe Princess was recollected, and the favourite was abashed.  Rasselas,\nmore deeply affected, inquired of Imlac whether he thought such maladies\nof the mind frequent, and how they were contracted.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIV\nTHE DANGEROUS PREVALENCE OF IMAGINATION.\n\n\n\u201cDISORDERS of intellect,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201chappen much more often than\nsuperficial observers will easily believe.  Perhaps if we speak with\nrigorous exactness, no human mind is in its right state.  There is no man\nwhose imagination does not sometimes predominate over his reason who can\nregulate his attention wholly by his will, and whose ideas will come and\ngo at his command.  No man will be found in whose mind airy notions do\nnot sometimes tyrannise, and force him to hope or fear beyond the limits\nof sober probability.  All power of fancy over reason is a degree of\ninsanity, but while this power is such as we can control and repress it\nis not visible to others, nor considered as any deprivation of the mental\nfaculties; it is not pronounced madness but when it becomes ungovernable,\nand apparently influences speech or action.\n\n\u201cTo indulge the power of fiction and send imagination out upon the wing\nis often the sport of those who delight too much in silent speculation.\nWhen we are alone we are not always busy; the labour of excogitation is\ntoo violent to last long; the ardour of inquiry will sometimes give way\nto idleness or satiety.  He who has nothing external that can divert him\nmust find pleasure in his own thoughts, and must conceive himself what he\nis not; for who is pleased with what he is?  He then expatiates in\nboundless futurity, and culls from all imaginable conditions that which\nfor the present moment he should most desire, amuses his desires with\nimpossible enjoyments, and confers upon his pride unattainable dominion.\nThe mind dances from scene to scene, unites all pleasures in all\ncombinations, and riots in delights which Nature and fortune, with all\ntheir bounty, cannot bestow.\n\n\u201cIn time some particular train of ideas fixes the attention; all other\nintellectual gratifications are rejected; the mind, in weariness or\nleisure, recurs constantly to the favourite conception, and feasts on the\nluscious falsehood whenever she is offended with the bitterness of truth.\nBy degrees the reign of fancy is confirmed; she grows first imperious and\nin time despotic.  Then fictions begin to operate as realities, false\nopinions fasten upon the mind, and life passes in dreams of rapture or of\nanguish.\n\n\u201cThis, sir, is one of the dangers of solitude, which the hermit has\nconfessed not always to promote goodness, and the astronomer\u2019s misery has\nproved to be not always propitious to wisdom.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will no more,\u201d said the favourite, \u201cimagine myself the Queen of\nAbyssinia.  I have often spent the hours which the Princess gave to my\nown disposal in adjusting ceremonies and regulating the Court; I have\nrepressed the pride of the powerful and granted the petitions of the\npoor; I have built new palaces in more happy situations, planted groves\nupon the tops of mountains, and have exulted in the beneficence of\nroyalty, till, when the Princess entered, I had almost forgotten to bow\ndown before her.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cwill not allow myself any more to play the\nshepherdess in my waking dreams.  I have often soothed my thoughts with\nthe quiet and innocence of pastoral employments, till I have in my\nchamber heard the winds whistle and the sheep bleat; sometimes freed the\nlamb entangled in the thicket, and sometimes with my crook encountered\nthe wolf.  I have a dress like that of the village maids, which I put on\nto help my imagination, and a pipe on which I play softly, and suppose\nmyself followed by my flocks.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will confess,\u201d said the Prince, \u201can indulgence of fantastic delight\nmore dangerous than yours.  I have frequently endeavoured to imagine the\npossibility of a perfect government, by which all wrong should be\nrestrained, all vice reformed, and all the subjects preserved in\ntranquillity and innocence.  This thought produced innumerable schemes of\nreformation, and dictated many useful regulations and salutary effects.\nThis has been the sport and sometimes the labour of my solitude, and I\nstart when I think with how little anguish I once supposed the death of\nmy father and my brothers.\u201d\n\n\u201cSuch,\u201d said Imlac, \u201care the effects of visionary schemes.  When we first\nform them, we know them to be absurd, but familiarise them by degrees,\nand in time lose sight of their folly.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLV\nTHEY DISCOURSE WITH AN OLD MAN.\n\n\nTHE evening was now far past, and they rose to return home.  As they\nwalked along the banks of the Nile, delighted with the beams of the moon\nquivering on the water, they saw at a small distance an old man whom the\nPrince had often heard in the assembly of the sages.  \u201cYonder,\u201d said he,\n\u201cis one whose years have calmed his passions, but not clouded his reason.\nLet us close the disquisitions of the night by inquiring what are his\nsentiments of his own state, that we may know whether youth alone is to\nstruggle with vexation, and whether any better hope remains for the\nlatter part of life.\u201d\n\nHere the sage approached and saluted them.  They invited him to join\ntheir walk, and prattled awhile as acquaintance that had unexpectedly met\none another.  The old man was cheerful and talkative, and the way seemed\nshort in his company.  He was pleased to find himself not disregarded,\naccompanied them to their house, and, at the Prince\u2019s request, entered\nwith them.  They placed him in the seat of honour, and set wine and\nconserves before him.\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d said the Princess, \u201can evening walk must give to a man of learning\nlike you pleasures which ignorance and youth can hardly conceive.  You\nknow the qualities and the causes of all that you behold\u2014the laws by\nwhich the river flows, the periods in which the planets perform their\nrevolutions.  Everything must supply you with contemplation, and renew\nthe consciousness of your own dignity.\u201d\n\n\u201cLady,\u201d answered he, \u201clet the gay and the vigorous expect pleasure in\ntheir excursions: it is enough that age can attain ease.  To me the world\nhas lost its novelty.  I look round, and see what I remember to have seen\nin happier days.  I rest against a tree, and consider that in the same\nshade I once disputed upon the annual overflow of the Nile with a friend\nwho is now silent in the grave.  I cast my eyes upwards, fix them on the\nchanging moon, and think with pain on the vicissitudes of life.  I have\nceased to take much delight in physical truth; for what have I to do with\nthose things which I am soon to leave?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou may at least recreate yourself,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cwith the recollection\nof an honourable and useful life, and enjoy the praise which all agree to\ngive you.\u201d\n\n\u201cPraise,\u201d said the sage with a sigh, \u201cis to an old man an empty sound.  I\nhave neither mother to be delighted with the reputation of her son, nor\nwife to partake the honours of her husband.  I have outlived my friends\nand my rivals.  Nothing is now of much importance; for I cannot extend my\ninterest beyond myself.  Youth is delighted with applause, because it is\nconsidered as the earnest of some future good, and because the prospect\nof life is far extended; but to me, who am now declining to decrepitude,\nthere is little to be feared from the malevolence of men, and yet less to\nbe hoped from their affection or esteem.  Something they may yet take\naway, but they can give me nothing.  Riches would now be useless, and\nhigh employment would be pain.  My retrospect of life recalls to my view\nmany opportunities of good neglected, much time squandered upon trifles,\nand more lost in idleness and vacancy.  I leave many great designs\nunattempted, and many great attempts unfinished.  My mind is burdened\nwith no heavy crime, and therefore I compose myself to tranquillity;\nendeavour to abstract my thoughts from hopes and cares which, though\nreason knows them to be vain, still try to keep their old possession of\nthe heart; expect, with serene humility, that hour which nature cannot\nlong delay, and hope to possess in a better state that happiness which\nhere I could not find, and that virtue which here I have not attained.\u201d\n\nHe arose and went away, leaving his audience not much elated with the\nhope of long life.  The Prince consoled himself with remarking that it\nwas not reasonable to be disappointed by this account; for age had never\nbeen considered as the season of felicity, and if it was possible to be\neasy in decline and weakness, it was likely that the days of vigour and\nalacrity might be happy; that the noon of life might be bright, if the\nevening could be calm.\n\nThe Princess suspected that age was querulous and malignant, and\ndelighted to repress the expectations of those who had newly entered the\nworld.  She had seen the possessors of estates look with envy on their\nheirs, and known many who enjoyed pleasures no longer than they could\nconfine it to themselves.\n\nPekuah conjectured that the man was older than he appeared, and was\nwilling to impute his complaints to delirious dejection; or else supposed\nthat he had been unfortunate, and was therefore discontented.  \u201cFor\nnothing,\u201d said she, \u201cis more common than to call our own condition the\ncondition of life.\u201d\n\nImlac, who had no desire to see them depressed, smiled at the comforts\nwhich they could so readily procure to themselves; and remembered that at\nthe same age he was equally confident of unmingled prosperity, and\nequally fertile of consolatory expedients.  He forbore to force upon them\nunwelcome knowledge, which time itself would too soon impress.  The\nPrincess and her lady retired; the madness of the astronomer hung upon\ntheir minds; and they desired Imlac to enter upon his office, and delay\nnext morning the rising of the sun.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLVI\nTHE PRINCESS AND PEKUAH VISIT THE ASTRONOMER.\n\n\nTHE Princess and Pekuah, having talked in private of Imlac\u2019s astronomer,\nthought his character at once so amiable and so strange that they could\nnot be satisfied without a nearer knowledge, and Imlac was requested to\nfind the means of bringing them together.\n\nThis was somewhat difficult.  The philosopher had never received any\nvisits from women, though he lived in a city that had in it many\nEuropeans, who followed the manners of their own countries, and many from\nother parts of the world, that lived there with European liberty.  The\nladies would not be refused, and several schemes were proposed for the\naccomplishment of their design.  It was proposed to introduce them as\nstrangers in distress, to whom the sage was always accessible; but after\nsome deliberation it appeared that by this artifice no acquaintance could\nbe formed, for their conversation would be short, and they could not\ndecently importune him often.  \u201cThis,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cis true; but I\nhave yet a stronger objection against the misrepresentation of your\nstate.  I have always considered it as treason against the great republic\nof human nature to make any man\u2019s virtues the means of deceiving him,\nwhether on great or little occasions.  All imposture weakens confidence\nand chills benevolence.  When the sage finds that you are not what you\nseemed, he will feel the resentment natural to a man who, conscious of\ngreat abilities, discovers that he has been tricked by understandings\nmeaner than his own, and perhaps the distrust which he can never\nafterwards wholly lay aside may stop the voice of counsel and close the\nhand of charity; and where will you find the power of restoring his\nbenefactions to mankind, or his peace to himself?\u201d\n\nTo this no reply was attempted, and Imlac began to hope that their\ncuriosity would subside; but next day Pekuah told him she had now found\nan honest pretence for a visit to the astronomer, for she would solicit\npermission to continue under him the studies in which she had been\ninitiated by the Arab, and the Princess might go with her, either as a\nfellow-student, or because a woman could not decently come alone.  \u201cI am\nafraid,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cthat he will soon be weary of your company.  Men\nadvanced far in knowledge do not love to repeat the elements of their\nart, and I am not certain that even of the elements, as he will deliver\nthem, connected with inferences and mingled with reflections, you are a\nvery capable auditress.\u201d  \u201cThat,\u201d said Pekuah, \u201cmust be my care.  I ask\nof you only to take me thither.  My knowledge is perhaps more than you\nimagine it, and by concurring always with his opinions I shall make him\nthink it greater than it is.\u201d\n\nThe astronomer, in pursuance of this resolution, was told that a foreign\nlady, travelling in search of knowledge, had heard of his reputation, and\nwas desirous to become his scholar.  The uncommonness of the proposal\nraised at once his surprise and curiosity, and when after a short\ndeliberation he consented to admit her, he could not stay without\nimpatience till the next day.\n\nThe ladies dressed themselves magnificently, and were attended by Imlac\nto the astronomer, who was pleased to see himself approached with respect\nby persons of so splendid an appearance.  In the exchange of the first\ncivilities he was timorous and bashful; but when the talk became regular,\nhe recollected his powers, and justified the character which Imlac had\ngiven.  Inquiring of Pekuah what could have turned her inclination\ntowards astronomy, he received from her a history of her adventure at the\nPyramid, and of the time passed in the Arab\u2019s island.  She told her tale\nwith ease and elegance, and her conversation took possession of his\nheart.  The discourse was then turned to astronomy.  Pekuah displayed\nwhat she knew.  He looked upon her as a prodigy of genius, and entreated\nher not to desist from a study which she had so happily begun.\n\nThey came again and again, and were every time more welcome than before.\nThe sage endeavoured to amuse them, that they might prolong their visits,\nfor he found his thoughts grow brighter in their company; the clouds of\nsolitude vanished by degrees as he forced himself to entertain them, and\nhe grieved when he was left, at their departure, to his old employment of\nregulating the seasons.\n\nThe Princess and her favourite had now watched his lips for several\nmonths, and could not catch a single word from which they could judge\nwhether he continued or not in the opinion of his preternatural\ncommission.  They often contrived to bring him to an open declaration;\nbut he easily eluded all their attacks, and, on which side soever they\npressed him, escaped from them to some other topic.\n\nAs their familiarity increased, they invited him often to the house of\nImlac, where they distinguished him by extraordinary respect.  He began\ngradually to delight in sublunary pleasures.  He came early and departed\nlate; laboured to recommend himself by assiduity and compliance; excited\ntheir curiosity after new arts, that they might still want his\nassistance; and when they made any excursion of pleasure or inquiry,\nentreated to attend them.\n\nBy long experience of his integrity and wisdom, the Prince and his sister\nwere convinced that he might be trusted without danger; and lest he\nshould draw any false hopes from the civilities which he received,\ndiscovered to him their condition, with the motives of their journey, and\nrequired his opinion on the choice of life.\n\n\u201cOf the various conditions which the world spreads before you which you\nshall prefer,\u201d said the sage, \u201cI am not able to instruct you.  I can only\ntell that I have chosen wrong.  I have passed my time in study without\nexperience\u2014in the attainment of sciences which can for the most part be\nbut remotely useful to mankind.  I have purchased knowledge at the\nexpense of all the common comforts of life; I have missed the endearing\nelegance of female friendship, and the happy commerce of domestic\ntenderness.  If I have obtained any prerogatives above other students,\nthey have been accompanied with fear, disquiet, and scrupulosity; but\neven of these prerogatives, whatever they were, I have, since my thoughts\nhave been diversified by more intercourse with the world, begun to\nquestion the reality.  When I have been for a few days lost in pleasing\ndissipation, I am always tempted to think that my inquiries have ended in\nerror, and that I have suffered much, and suffered it in vain.\u201d\n\nImlac was delighted to find that the sage\u2019s understanding was breaking\nthrough its mists, and resolved to detain him from the planets till he\nshould forget his task of ruling them, and reason should recover its\noriginal influence.\n\nFrom this time the astronomer was received into familiar friendship, and\npartook of all their projects and pleasures; his respect kept him\nattentive, and the activity of Rasselas did not leave much time\nunengaged.  Something was always to be done; the day was spent in making\nobservations, which furnished talk for the evening, and the evening was\nclosed with a scheme for the morrow.\n\nThe sage confessed to Imlac that since he had mingled in the gay tumults\nof life, and divided his hours by a succession of amusements, he found\nthe conviction of his authority over the skies fade gradually from his\nmind, and began to trust less to an opinion which he never could prove to\nothers, and which he now found subject to variation, from causes in which\nreason had no part.  \u201cIf I am accidentally left alone for a few hours,\u201d\nsaid he, \u201cmy inveterate persuasion rushes upon my soul, and my thoughts\nare chained down by some irresistible violence; but they are soon\ndisentangled by the Prince\u2019s conversation, and instantaneously released\nat the entrance of Pekuah.  I am like a man habitually afraid of\nspectres, who is set at ease by a lamp, and wonders at the dread which\nharassed him in the dark; yet, if his lamp be extinguished, feels again\nthe terrors which he knows that when it is light he shall feel no more.\nBut I am sometimes afraid, lest I indulge my quiet by criminal\nnegligence, and voluntarily forget the great charge with which I am\nentrusted.  If I favour myself in a known error, or am determined by my\nown ease in a doubtful question of this importance, how dreadful is my\ncrime!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo disease of the imagination,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201cis so difficult of cure\nas that which is complicated with the dread of guilt; fancy and\nconscience then act interchangeably upon us, and so often shift their\nplaces, that the illusions of one are not distinguished from the dictates\nof the other.  If fancy presents images not moral or religious, the mind\ndrives them away when they give it pain; but when melancholy notions take\nthe form of duty, they lay hold on the faculties without opposition,\nbecause we are afraid to exclude or banish them.  For this reason the\nsuperstitious are often melancholy, and the melancholy almost always\nsuperstitious.\n\n\u201cBut do not let the suggestions of timidity overpower your better reason;\nthe danger of neglect can be but as the probability of the obligation,\nwhich, when you consider it with freedom, you find very little, and that\nlittle growing every day less.  Open your heart to the influence of the\nlight, which from time to time breaks in upon you; when scruples\nimportune you, which you in your lucid moments know to be vain, do not\nstand to parley, but fly to business or to Pekuah; and keep this thought\nalways prevalent, that you are only one atom of the mass of humanity, and\nhave neither such virtue nor vice as that you should be singled out for\nsupernatural favours or afflictions.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLVII\nTHE PRINCE ENTERS, AND BRINGS A NEW TOPIC.\n\n\n\u201cALL this,\u201d said the astronomer, \u201cI have often thought; but my reason has\nbeen so long subjugated by an uncontrollable and overwhelming idea, that\nit durst not confide in its own decisions.  I now see how fatally I\nbetrayed my quiet, by suffering chimeras to prey upon me in secret; but\nmelancholy shrinks from communication, and I never found a man before to\nwhom I could impart my troubles, though I had been certain of relief.  I\nrejoice to find my own sentiments confirmed by yours, who are not easily\ndeceived, and can have no motive or purpose to deceive.  I hope that time\nand variety will dissipate the gloom that has so long surrounded me, and\nthe latter part of my days will be spent in peace.\u201d\n\n\u201cYour learning and virtue,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cmay justly give you hopes.\u201d\n\nRasselas then entered, with the Princess and Pekuah, and inquired whether\nthey had contrived any new diversion for the next day.  \u201cSuch,\u201d said\nNekayah, \u201cis the state of life, that none are happy but by the\nanticipation of change; the change itself is nothing; when we have made\nit the next wish is to change again.  The world is not yet exhausted: let\nme see something to-morrow which I never saw before.\u201d\n\n\u201cVariety,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cis so necessary to content, that even the\nHappy Valley disgusted me by the recurrence of its luxuries; yet I could\nnot forbear to reproach myself with impatience when I saw the monks of\nSt. Anthony support, without complaint, a life, not of uniform delight,\nbut uniform hardship.\u201d\n\n\u201cThose men,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201care less wretched in their silent convent\nthan the Abyssinian princes in their prison of pleasure.  Whatever is\ndone by the monks is incited by an adequate and reasonable motive.  Their\nlabour supplies them with necessaries; it therefore cannot be omitted,\nand is certainly rewarded.  Their devotion prepares them for another\nstate, and reminds them of its approach while it fits them for it.  Their\ntime is regularly distributed; one duty succeeds another, so that they\nare not left open to the distraction of unguided choice, nor lost in the\nshades of listless inactivity.  There is a certain task to be performed\nat an appropriated hour, and their toils are cheerful, because they\nconsider them as acts of piety by which they are always advancing towards\nendless felicity.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you think,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cthat the monastic rule is a more holy and\nless imperfect state than any other?  May not he equally hope for future\nhappiness who converses openly with mankind, who succours the distressed\nby his charity, instructs the ignorant by his learning, and contributes\nby his industry to the general system of life, even though he should omit\nsome of the mortifications which are practised in the cloister, and allow\nhimself such harmless delights as his condition may place within his\nreach?\u201d\n\n\u201cThis,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis a question which has long divided the wise and\nperplexed the good.  I am afraid to decide on either part.  He that lives\nwell in the world is better than he that lives well in a monastery.  But\nperhaps everyone is not able to stem the temptations of public life, and\nif he cannot conquer he may properly retreat.  Some have little power to\ndo good, and have likewise little strength to resist evil.  Many are\nweary of the conflicts with adversity, and are willing to eject those\npassions which have long busied them in vain.  And many are dismissed by\nage and diseases from the more laborious duties of society.  In\nmonasteries the weak and timorous may be happily sheltered, the weary may\nrepose, and the penitent may meditate.  Those retreats of prayer and\ncontemplation have something so congenial to the mind of man, that\nperhaps there is scarcely one that does not purpose to close his life in\npious abstraction, with a few associates serious as himself.\u201d\n\n\u201cSuch,\u201d said Pekuah, \u201chas often been my wish, and I have heard the\nPrincess declare that she should not willingly die in a crowd.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe liberty of using harmless pleasures,\u201d proceeded Imlac, \u201cwill not be\ndisputed, but it is still to be examined what pleasures are harmless.\nThe evil of any pleasure that Nekayah can image is not in the act itself\nbut in its consequences.  Pleasure in itself harmless may become\nmischievous by endearing to us a state which we know to be transient and\nprobatory, and withdrawing our thoughts from that of which every hour\nbrings us nearer to the beginning, and of which no length of time will\nbring us to the end.  Mortification is not virtuous in itself, nor has\nany other use but that it disengages us from the allurements of sense.\nIn the state of future perfection to which we all aspire there will be\npleasure without danger and security without restraint.\u201d\n\nThe Princess was silent, and Rasselas, turning to the astronomer, asked\nhim whether he could not delay her retreat by showing her something which\nshe had not seen before.\n\n\u201cYour curiosity,\u201d said the sage, \u201chas been so general, and your pursuit\nof knowledge so vigorous, that novelties are not now very easily to be\nfound; but what you can no longer procure from the living may be given by\nthe dead.  Among the wonders of this country are the catacombs, or the\nancient repositories in which the bodies of the earliest generations were\nlodged, and where, by the virtue of the gums which embalmed them, they\nyet remain without corruption.\u201d\n\n\u201cI know not,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201cwhat pleasure the sight of the catacombs\ncan afford; but, since nothing else is offered, I am resolved to view\nthem, and shall place this with my other things which I have done because\nI would do something.\u201d\n\nThey hired a guard of horsemen, and the next day visited the catacombs.\nWhen they were about to descend into the sepulchral caves, \u201cPekuah,\u201d said\nthe Princess, \u201cwe are now again invading the habitations of the dead; I\nknow that you will stay behind.  Let me find you safe when I return.\u201d\n\u201cNo, I will not be left,\u201d answered Pekuah, \u201cI will go down between you\nand the Prince.\u201d\n\nThey then all descended, and roved with wonder through the labyrinth of\nsubterraneous passages, where the bodies were laid in rows on either\nside.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLVIII\nIMLAC DISCOURSES ON THE NATURE OF THE SOUL.\n\n\n\u201cWHAT reason,\u201d said the Prince, \u201ccan be given why the Egyptians should\nthus expensively preserve those carcases which some nations consume with\nfire, others lay to mingle with the earth, and all agree to remove from\ntheir sight as soon as decent rites can be performed?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe original of ancient customs,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cis commonly unknown, for\nthe practice often continues when the cause has ceased; and concerning\nsuperstitious ceremonies it is vain to conjecture; for what reason did\nnot dictate, reason cannot explain.  I have long believed that the\npractice of embalming arose only from tenderness to the remains of\nrelations or friends; and to this opinion I am more inclined because it\nseems impossible that this care should have been general; had all the\ndead been embalmed, their repositories must in time have been more\nspacious than the dwellings of the living.  I suppose only the rich or\nhonourable were secured from corruption, and the rest left to the course\nof nature.\n\n\u201cBut it is commonly supposed that the Egyptians believed the soul to live\nas long as the body continued undissolved, and therefore tried this\nmethod of eluding death.\u201d\n\n\u201cCould the wise Egyptians,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cthink so grossly of the soul?\nIf the soul could once survive its separation, what could it afterwards\nreceive or suffer from the body?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe Egyptians would doubtless think erroneously,\u201d said the astronomer,\n\u201cin the darkness of heathenism and the first dawn of philosophy.  The\nnature of the soul is still disputed amidst all our opportunities of\nclearer knowledge; some yet say that it may be material, who,\nnevertheless, believe it to be immortal.\u201d\n\n\u201cSome,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201chave indeed said that the soul is material, but\nI can scarcely believe that any man has thought it who knew how to think;\nfor all the conclusions of reason enforce the immateriality of mind, and\nall the notices of sense and investigations of science concur to prove\nthe unconsciousness of matter.\n\n\u201cIt was never supposed that cogitation is inherent in matter, or that\nevery particle is a thinking being.  Yet if any part of matter be devoid\nof thought, what part can we suppose to think?  Matter can differ from\nmatter only in form, density, bulk, motion, and direction of motion.  To\nwhich of these, however varied or combined, can consciousness be annexed?\nTo be round or square, to be solid or fluid, to be great or little, to be\nmoved slowly or swiftly, one way or another, are modes of material\nexistence all equally alien from the nature of cogitation.  If matter be\nonce without thought, it can only be made to think by some new\nmodification; but all the modifications which it can admit are equally\nunconnected with cogitative powers.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut the materialists,\u201d said the astronomer, \u201curge that matter may have\nqualities with which we are unacquainted.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe who will determine,\u201d returned Imlac, \u201cagainst that which he knows\nbecause there may be something which he knows not; he that can set\nhypothetical possibility against acknowledged certainty, is not to be\nadmitted among reasonable beings.  All that we know of matter is, that\nmatter is inert, senseless, and lifeless; and if this conviction cannot\nhe opposed but by referring us to something that we know not, we have all\nthe evidence that human intellect can admit.  If that which is known may\nbe overruled by that which is unknown, no being, not omniscient, can\narrive at certainty.\u201d\n\n\u201cYet let us not,\u201d said the astronomer, \u201ctoo arrogantly limit the\nCreator\u2019s power.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is no limitation of Omnipotence,\u201d replied the poet, \u201cto suppose that\none thing is not consistent with another, that the same proposition\ncannot be at once true and false, that the same number cannot be even and\nodd, that cogitation cannot be conferred on that which is created\nincapable of cogitation.\u201d\n\n\u201cI know not,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cany great use of this question.  Does that\nimmateriality, which in my opinion you have sufficiently proved,\nnecessarily include eternal duration?\u201d\n\n\u201cOf immateriality,\u201d said Imlac, \u201cour ideas are negative, and therefore\nobscure.  Immateriality seems to imply a natural power of perpetual\nduration as a consequence of exemption from all causes of decay: whatever\nperishes is destroyed by the solution of its contexture and separation of\nits parts; nor can we conceive how that which has no parts, and therefore\nadmits no solution, can be naturally corrupted or impaired.\u201d\n\n\u201cI know not,\u201d said Rasselas, \u201chow to conceive anything without extension:\nwhat is extended must have parts, and you allow that whatever has parts\nmay be destroyed.\u201d\n\n\u201cConsider your own conceptions,\u201d replied Imlac, \u201cand the difficulty will\nbe less.  You will find substance without extension.  An ideal form is no\nless real than material bulk; yet an ideal form has no extension.  It is\nno less certain, when you think on a pyramid, that your mind possesses\nthe idea of a pyramid, than that the pyramid itself is standing.  What\nspace does the idea of a pyramid occupy more than the idea of a grain of\ncorn? or how can either idea suffer laceration?  As is the effect, such\nis the cause; as thought, such is the power that thinks, a power\nimpassive and indiscerptible.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut the Being,\u201d said Nekayah, \u201cwhom I fear to name, the Being which made\nthe soul, can destroy it.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe surely can destroy it,\u201d answered Imlac, \u201csince, however imperishable,\nit receives from a superior nature its power of duration.  That it will\nnot perish by any inherent cause of decay or principle of corruption, may\nbe shown by philosophy; but philosophy can tell no more.  That it will\nnot be annihilated by Him that made it, we must humbly learn from higher\nauthority.\u201d\n\nThe whole assembly stood awhile silent and collected.  \u201cLet us return,\u201d\nsaid Rasselas, \u201cfrom this scene of mortality.  How gloomy would be these\nmansions of the dead to him who did not know that he should never die;\nthat what now acts shall continue its agency, and what now thinks shall\nthink on for ever.  Those that lie here stretched before us, the wise and\nthe powerful of ancient times, warn us to remember the shortness of our\npresent state; they were perhaps snatched away while they were busy, like\nus, in the _choice of life_.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo me,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cthe choice of life is become less important;\nI hope hereafter to think only on the choice of eternity.\u201d\n\nThey then hastened out of the caverns, and under the protection of their\nguard returned to Cairo.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIX\nTHE CONCLUSION, IN WHICH NOTHING IS CONCLUDED.\n\n\nIT was now the time of the inundation of the Nile.  A few days after\ntheir visit to the catacombs the river began to rise.\n\nThey were confined to their house.  The whole region being under water,\ngave them no invitation to any excursions; and being well supplied with\nmaterials for talk, they diverted themselves with comparisons of the\ndifferent forms of life which they had observed, and with various schemes\nof happiness which each of them had formed.\n\nPekuah was never so much charmed with any place as the Convent of St.\nAnthony, where the Arab restored her to the Princess, and wished only to\nfill it with pious maidens and to be made prioress of the order.  She was\nweary of expectation and disgust, and would gladly be fixed in some\nunvariable state.\n\nThe Princess thought that, of all sublunary things, knowledge was the\nbest.  She desired first to learn all sciences, and then proposed to\nfound a college of learned women, in which she would preside, that, by\nconversing with the old and educating the young, she might divide her\ntime between the acquisition and communication of wisdom, and raise up\nfor the next age models of prudence and patterns of piety.\n\nThe Prince desired a little kingdom in which he might administer justice\nin his own person and see all the parts of government with his own eyes;\nbut he could never fix the limits of his dominion, and was always adding\nto the number of his subjects.\n\nImlac and the astronomer were contented to be driven along the stream of\nlife without directing their course to any particular port.\n\nOf those wishes that they had formed they well knew that none could be\nobtained.  They deliberated awhile what was to be done, and resolved,\nwhen the inundation should cease, to return to Abyssinia.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n  Printed by Cassell & Company, Limited, La Belle Sauvage, London, E.C.","title":"Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":37997}