FRAGMENT. 2Ù^ 



minutive fizô. Solitude, however, was rather ini- 

 mical to my condition, in difpofing the mind too 

 intenfely to meditation. To J; 7- Roujeau I fland 

 indebted for the re-eftablifhment of my health. I 

 had read in his immortal productions, among 

 other natural truths, that Man was made to adt, 

 and not to meditate» Hitherto, 1 h id exercifed 

 my mind, and fuffered my body to reft; I now 

 inverted the order of that regimen t I exei cifed the 

 body, and gave repofe to the mind. 1 renounced 

 the greareft part of books. I threw my eyes 

 upon the Works of Nature, which fpake, to all my 

 fenfes, à language which neither time rlor nations 

 have it in their power to alter. My Hiftory, and 

 my Journals, were the herbage of the fields and 

 meadows. My thoughts did not painfully go 

 forth in queft of them, as in the cafe of human 

 fyftems; but their thoughts quietly fought out 

 me, under a thoufand engaging forms. In thefe 1 

 ftudied, without effort, the laws of that univerfal 

 Wifdom, with which I had been furrounded from 

 the cradle, and on which 1 had hitherto beftowed 

 a very fuperficial attention. I purfued the trace^ 

 of them in every part of the World, by reading 

 books of Travels. Thefe were the only modern, 

 books for which I retained a relifh, becaufe they 

 tranfported me into other focieties than that in 

 which 1 was unhappy, and, efpecially, becaufe thejr 

 fpake to me of the various Works of Nature. 

 VOL. V. ? By 



