Elegance Is Inferior To Virtue.

The Labours Of Men Of Genius, However Erroneously Directed, Scarcely Ever Fail In Ultimately Turning To The Solid Advantage Of Mankind.

For A Moment My Soul Was Elevated From Its Debasing And Miserable Fears To Which These Sights Were The Monuments And The Remembrances. For An Instant I Dared To Shake Off My Chains, And Look Around Me With A Free And Lofty Spirit; But The Iron Had Eaten Into My Flesh, And I Sank Again, Trembling And Hopeless, Into My Miserable Self.

Life And Death Appeared To Me Ideal Bounds, Which I Should First Break Through, And Pour A Torrent Of Light Into Our Dark World.

What Terrified Me Will Terrify Others; And I Need Only Describe The Spectre Which Had Haunted My Midnight Pillow.

The Day Of My Departure At Length Arrived. Clerval Spent The Last Evening With Us. He Had Endeavoured To Persuade His Father To Permit Him To Accompany Me And To Become My Fellow Student, But In Vain. His Father Was A Narrow-minded Trader, And Saw Idleness And Ruin In The Aspirations And Ambition Of His Son. Henry Deeply Felt The Misfortune Of Being Debarred From A Liberal Education. He Said Little, But When He Spoke I Read In His Kindling Eye And In His Animated Glance A Restrained But Firm Resolve Not To Be Chained To The Miserable Details Of Commerce.