A passage from "The sorrows of young werther"
I stumbled on a couple of old LJ posts from last year, I thought they were brilliant and wished to repost them, for no apparent reason other than to have them around once more.
It's a fairly big passage, but it's definately worth reading.
Must it ever be thus, -- that the source of our happiness must
also be the fountain of our misery? The full and ardent sentiment
which animated my heart with the love of nature, overwhelming me
with a torrent of delight, and which brought all paradise before
me, has now become an insupportable torment, a demon which perpetually
pursues and harasses me. When in bygone days I gazed from these
rocks upon yonder mountains across the river, and upon the green,
flowery valley before me, and saw all nature budding and bursting
around; the hills clothed from foot to peak with tall, thick forest
trees; the valleys in all their varied windings, shaded with the
loveliest woods; and the soft river gliding along amongst the
lisping reeds, mirroring the beautiful clouds which the soft evening
breeze wafted across the sky, -- when I heard the groves about me
melodious with the music of birds, and saw the million swarms of
insects dancing in the last golden beams of the sun, whose setting
rays awoke the humming beetles from their grassy beds, whilst the
subdued tumult around directed my attention to the ground, and I
there observed the arid rock compelled to yield nutriment to the
dry moss, whilst the heath flourished upon the barren sands below
me, all this displayed to me the inner warmth which animates all
nature, and filled and glowed within my heart.
My dear friend, the bare recollection of those hours still consoles
me. Even this effort to recall those ineffable sensations, and
give them utterance, exalts my soul above itself, and makes me
doubly feel the intensity of my present anguish.
It is as if a curtain had been drawn from before my eyes, and,
instead of prospects of eternal life, the abyss of an ever open
grave yawned before me. Can we say of anything that it exists
when all passes away, when time, with the speed of a storm, carries
all things onward, -- and our transitory existence, hurried along
by the torrent, is either swallowed up by the waves or dashed
against the rocks? There is not a moment but preys upon you, --
and upon all around you, not a moment in which you do not yourself
become a destroyer. The most innocent walk deprives of life
thousands of poor insects: one step destroys the fabric of the
industrious ant, and converts a little world into chaos. No: it
is not the great and rare calamities of the world, the floods which
sweep away whole villages, the earthquakes which swallow up our
towns, that affect me. My heart is wasted by the thought of that
destructive power which lies concealed in every part of universal
nature. Nature has formed nothing that does not consume itself,
and every object near it: so that, surrounded by earth and air,
and all the active powers, I wander on my way with aching heart;
and the universe is to me a fearful monster, for ever devouring
its own offspring.
how my senses are dried up, but my heart is at no
time full. I enjoy no single moment of happiness: all is vain --
nothing touches me. In the evening I say I will enjoy the next morning's
sunrise, and yet I remain in bed: in the day I promise to ramble
by moonlight; and I, nevertheless, remain in bed. I know not why
I rise, nor why I go to sleep.
The leaven which animated my existence is gone: the charm which
cheered me in the gloom of night, and aroused me from my morning
slumbers, is for ever fled.
-----------------
I couldn't have put it better myself.
It's a fairly big passage, but it's definately worth reading.
Must it ever be thus, -- that the source of our happiness must
also be the fountain of our misery? The full and ardent sentiment
which animated my heart with the love of nature, overwhelming me
with a torrent of delight, and which brought all paradise before
me, has now become an insupportable torment, a demon which perpetually
pursues and harasses me. When in bygone days I gazed from these
rocks upon yonder mountains across the river, and upon the green,
flowery valley before me, and saw all nature budding and bursting
around; the hills clothed from foot to peak with tall, thick forest
trees; the valleys in all their varied windings, shaded with the
loveliest woods; and the soft river gliding along amongst the
lisping reeds, mirroring the beautiful clouds which the soft evening
breeze wafted across the sky, -- when I heard the groves about me
melodious with the music of birds, and saw the million swarms of
insects dancing in the last golden beams of the sun, whose setting
rays awoke the humming beetles from their grassy beds, whilst the
subdued tumult around directed my attention to the ground, and I
there observed the arid rock compelled to yield nutriment to the
dry moss, whilst the heath flourished upon the barren sands below
me, all this displayed to me the inner warmth which animates all
nature, and filled and glowed within my heart.
My dear friend, the bare recollection of those hours still consoles
me. Even this effort to recall those ineffable sensations, and
give them utterance, exalts my soul above itself, and makes me
doubly feel the intensity of my present anguish.
It is as if a curtain had been drawn from before my eyes, and,
instead of prospects of eternal life, the abyss of an ever open
grave yawned before me. Can we say of anything that it exists
when all passes away, when time, with the speed of a storm, carries
all things onward, -- and our transitory existence, hurried along
by the torrent, is either swallowed up by the waves or dashed
against the rocks? There is not a moment but preys upon you, --
and upon all around you, not a moment in which you do not yourself
become a destroyer. The most innocent walk deprives of life
thousands of poor insects: one step destroys the fabric of the
industrious ant, and converts a little world into chaos. No: it
is not the great and rare calamities of the world, the floods which
sweep away whole villages, the earthquakes which swallow up our
towns, that affect me. My heart is wasted by the thought of that
destructive power which lies concealed in every part of universal
nature. Nature has formed nothing that does not consume itself,
and every object near it: so that, surrounded by earth and air,
and all the active powers, I wander on my way with aching heart;
and the universe is to me a fearful monster, for ever devouring
its own offspring.
how my senses are dried up, but my heart is at no
time full. I enjoy no single moment of happiness: all is vain --
nothing touches me. In the evening I say I will enjoy the next morning's
sunrise, and yet I remain in bed: in the day I promise to ramble
by moonlight; and I, nevertheless, remain in bed. I know not why
I rise, nor why I go to sleep.
The leaven which animated my existence is gone: the charm which
cheered me in the gloom of night, and aroused me from my morning
slumbers, is for ever fled.
-----------------
I couldn't have put it better myself.