[00:03.61]On Going a Journey
[00:08.09]One of the pleasantest things in the world is going a journey:
[00:13.67]but I like to go by myself. I can enjoy society in a room;
[00:18.81]but out of doors, nature is company enough for me.
[00:22.32]I am then never less alone than when alone.
[00:25.81]"The fields his study, nature was his book."
[00:29.76]I cannot see the wit of walking and talking at the same time.
[00:33.81]When I am in the country I wish to vegetate like the country.
[00:38.07]I am not for criticizing hedges and black cattle.
[00:41.35]I go out for town in order to forget the town and all that is in it.
[00:45.84]There are those who for this purpose go to watering places,
[00:48.90]and carry the metropolis with them.
[00:50.98]I like more space and fewer obstacles.
[00:54.26]I like solitude, when I give myself up to it, for the sake of solitude;
[00:59.19]nor do I ask for "a friend in my retreat,
[01:02.58]whom I may whisper solitude is sweet."
[01:04.98]The soul of journey is liberty, perfect liberty,
[01:09.03]to think, feel, do, just as one pleases.
[01:13.18]We go a journey chiefly to be free of all obstacles and all inconveniences;
[01:19.31]to leave ourselves behind, much more to get rid of others.
[01:23.36]It is because I want a little breathing space
[01:25.87]to ponder on indifferent matters,
[01:27.62]where contemplation "May plume her feathers and let grow her wings,
[01:32.87]that in the various bustle of resort were all too ruffled,
[01:36.58]and sometimes impaired."
[01:38.55]I absent myself from the town for a while,
[01:41.07]without feeling at a loss the moment I am left by myself.
[01:44.68]Instead of a friend in a post chaise or in a carriage,
[01:47.93]to exchange good things with, and vary the same stale topics over again,
[01:52.85]for once let me have a time free from manners.
[01:56.78]Give me the clear blue sky over my head,
[02:00.07]and the green turf beneath my feet, a winding road before me,
[02:04.44]and the three hours' march to dinner — and then to thinking!
[02:07.83]It is hard if I cannot start some game on these lone heaths.
[02:12.10]I laugh, I run, I leap, I sing for joy!
[02:16.69]From the point of yonder rolling cloud I plunge into my past being,
[02:21.72]and revel there as the sun-burnt Indian plunges headlong into the wave
[02:26.21]that wafts him to his native shore.
[02:28.72]Then long-forgotten things like "sunken wrack and sumless treasuries",
[02:33.53]burst upon my eager sight, and I begin to feel, think, and be myself again.
[02:39.33]Instead of an awkward silence,
[02:41.52]broken by attempts at wit or dull commonplaces,
[02:44.85]mine is that undisturbed silence of the heart
[02:48.14]which alone is perfect eloquence.