have ever taken great pleasure in taming animals, particularly those that
are wild and fearful. It appeared delightful to me, to inspire them with
a confidence which I took care never to abuse, wishing them to love me
freely.

I have already mentioned that I purchased some books: I did not forget to
read them, but in a manner more proper to fatigue than instruct me.
I imagined that to read a book profitably, it was necessary to be
acquainted with every branch of knowledge it even mentioned; far from
thinking that the author did not do this himself, but drew assistance
from other books, as he might see occasion. Full of this silly idea, I
was stopped every moment, obliged to run from one book to another, and
sometimes, before I could reach the tenth page of what I was studying,
found it necessary to turn over a whole library. I was so attached to
this ridiculous method, that I lost a prodigious deal of time and had
bewildered my head to such a degree, that I was hardly capable of doing,
seeing or comprehending anything. I fortunately perceived, at length,
that I was in the wrong road, which would entangle me in an inextricable
labyrinth, and quitted it before I was irrevocably lost.

When a person has any real taste for the sciences, the first thing he
perceives in the pursuit of them is that connection by which they
mutually attract, assist, and enlighten each other, and that it is
impossible to attain one without the assistance of the rest. Though the
human understanding cannot grasp all, and one must ever be regarded as
the principal object, yet if the rest are totally neglected, the favorite
study is generally obscure; I was convinced that my resolution to improve
was good and useful in itself, but that it was necessary I should change
my method; I, therefore, had recourse to the encyclopaedia. I began by a
distribution of the general mass of human knowledge into its various