ppears to me the greater. 'Tis a rare fortune, but of
inestimable solace; to have a worthy man, one of a sound judgment and of
manners conformable to your own, who takes a delight to bear you company.
I have been at an infinite loss for such upon my travels. But such a
companion should be chosen and acquired from your first setting out.
There can be no pleasure to me without communication: there is not so
much as a sprightly thought comes into my mind, that it does not grieve
me to have produced alone, and that I have no one to communicate it to:

"Si cum hac exceptione detur sapientia,
ut illam inclusam teneam, nec enuntiem, rejiciam."

["If wisdom be conferred with this reservation, that I must keep it
to myself, and not communicate it to others, I would none of it."
--Seneca, Ep., 6.]

This other has strained it one note higher:

"Si contigerit ea vita sapienti, ut ommum rerum afliuentibus copiis,
quamvis omnia, quae cognitione digna sunt, summo otio secum ipse
consideret et contempletur, tamen, si solitudo tanta sit, ut hominem
videre non possit, excedat a vita."

["If such a condition of life should happen to a wise man, that in
the greatest plenty of all conveniences he might, at the most
undisturbed leisure, consider and contemplate all things worth the
knowing, yet if his solitude be such that he must not see a man, let
him depart from life."--Cicero, De Offic., i. 43.]

Architas pleases me when he says, "that it would be unpleasant, even in
heaven itself, to wander in those great and divine celestial bodies
without a companion. But yet 'tis much better to be alone than in
foolish and troublesome company. Aristippus loved to live as a stranger
in all places:

"Me si fata meis paterentur ducere vitam
Auspiciis,"

["If the fates would let me live in my own way."--AEneid, iv. 340.]

I should choose to pass away the greatest part of my life on horseback:

"Visere gestiens,
Qua pane debacchentur ignes,
Qua nebula, pluviique rores."

["Visit the regions where the sun burns, where are the thick
rain-clouds and the frosts."--Horace, Od., iii. 3, 54.]

"Have you not more easy diversions at home? What do you there want? Is
not your house situated in a sweet and healthful air, sufficiently
furnished, and more than sufficien