OLD HOUSES. 401 



sion, is founded on the natural yearning of every human 

 soul after freedom and simplicity. In them we behold 

 the evidences of a mode of life, which, if we could but 

 rid our hearts of a little insanity, we should above all 

 choose for ourselves. The human heart naturally attaches 

 itself to those scenes in which it would be free to indulge 

 its own natural fancies. But there is a habit stronger 

 than nature, derived from our perverted education, that 

 causes us to choose a part that will excite the envy of 

 our neighbors, in preference to one that would best pro- 

 mote our own happiness. Hence a man chooses to be 

 embarrassed with expenses above his pecuniary condition, 

 for the vain purpose of exciting admiration, rather than 

 to gratify his own tastes in the enjoyment of greater 

 freedom and a more humble and frugal mode of life. 



In vain does the worshipper of fashion, by planting an 

 ornate dwelling-house in the heart of a forest, endeavor 

 to add to it the charm of a rustic cottage in the woods. 

 The traveller, as he beholds its proud ornaments glit- 

 tering through the trees, sees nothing of that charming 

 repose which, like a halo of beauty, surrounds the cot- 

 tage of the rustic. He perceives in it the expression of 

 a striving after something that is incompatible with its 

 affectations. There may be a true love of nature among 

 the inmates of this house. But they cannot consent 

 wholly to relinquish that bondage of fashion which 

 overpowers their love of freedom and simplicity, as 

 the appetite of the inebriate causes him, in spite of 

 his better resolutions, to turn back to the cup that is 

 destroying him. Nature may harmonize with elegance, 

 refinement, and grandeur, but not with pretence. The 

 rural deities will not make their haunts near the abode 

 of vanity ; and the Naiad, when she sees her rustic 

 fountain destroyed, turns sorrowfully away from the 

 spouting foam of a jd d'eau. 



