Our affection toward others creates a sort of vantage
or purchase which nothing will supply. I can do that by another which
I cannot do alone. I can say to you what I cannot first say to myself.
Other men are lenses through which we read our own minds. Each man
seeks those of different quality from his own, and such as are good
of their kind; that is, he seeks other men, and the otherest. The
stronger the nature, the more it is reactive. Let us have the quality
pure. A little genius let us leave alone. A main difference betwixt
men is, whether they attend their own affair or not. Man is that noble
endogenous plant which grows, like the palm, from within, outward. His
own affair, though impossible to others, he can open with celerity and
in sport. It is easy to sugar to be sweet, and to nitre to be salt.
We take a great deal of pains to waylay and entrap that which of itself
will fall into our hands. I count him a great man who inhabits a higher
sphere of thought, into which other men rise with labor and difficulty;
he has but to open his eyes to see things in a true light, and in large
relations; whilst they must make painful corrections, and keep a
vigilant eye on many sources of error.
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