second year, from its obvious and palpable commencement, that it grew to
the height that I have described. It began with a distaste to all that
I had been accustomed to enjoy or to pursue. Music, which I had always
passionately loved, though from some defect in the organs of hearing, I
was incapable of attaining the smallest knowledge of the science, music
lost all its diviner spells, all its properties of creating a new
existence, a life of dreaming and vain luxuries, within the mind: it
became only a monotonous sound, less grateful to the languor of my
faculties than an utter and dead stillness. I had never been what is
generally termed a boon companion; but I had had the social vanities, if
not the social tastes; I had insensibly loved the board which echoed
with applause at my sallies, and the comrades who, while they deprecated
my satire, had been complaisant enough to hail it as wit. One of my
weaknesses is a love of show, and I had gratified a feeling not the less
cherished because it arose from a petty source, in obtaining for my
equipages, my mansion, my banquets, the celebrity which is given no less
to magnificence than to fame: now I grew indifferent alike to the signs
of pomp, and to the baubles of taste; praise fell upon a listless ear,
and (rare pitch of satiety!) the pleasures that are the offspring of our
foibles delighted me no more. I had early learned from Bolingbroke a
love for the converse of men, eminent, whether for wisdom or for wit:
the graceful /badinage,/ or the keen critique; the sparkling flight of
the winged words which circled and rebounded from lip to lip, or the
deep speculation upon the mysterious and unravelled wonders of man, of
Nature, and the world; the light maxim upon manners, or the sage inquiry
into the mines of learning, all and each had possessed a link to bind my
temper and my tastes to the graces and fascination of social life. Now
a new spirit entered within me: the smile faded from my lip, and the
jest departed from my tongue; memory seemed no less treacherous than
fancy, and deserted me the instant I attempted to enter into those