mperishable; and shall not we, who contemplate it with such
intense yearnings, imbibe a portion of ethereal fire, the _divinae
particula aurae_, which nothing can extinguish? I remember to have
looked at a print of Rembrandt for hours together, without being
conscious of the flight of time, trying to resolve it into its
component parts, to connect its strong and sharp gradations, to learn
the secret of its reflected lights, and found neither satiety nor
pause in the prosecution of my studies. The print over which I was
poring would last long enough; why should the idea in my mind, which
was finer, more impalpable, perish before it? At this, I redoubled the
ardour of my pursuit, and by the very subtlety and refinement of my
inquiries, seemed to bespeak for them an exemption from corruption and
the rude grasp of Death.[41]

[Footnote 41: Is it not this that frequently keeps artists alive so
long, _viz._ the constant occupation of their minds with vivid images,
with little of the _wear-and-tear_ of the body?]

Objects, on our first acquaintance with them, have that singleness and
integrity of impression that it seems as if nothing could destroy or
obliterate them, so firmly are they stamped and rivetted on the brain.
We repose on them with a sort of voluptuous indolence, in full faith
and boundless confidence. We are absorbed in the present moment, or
return to the same point--idling away a great deal of time in youth,
thinking we have enough and to spare. There is often a local feeling
in the air, which is as fixed as if it were of marble; we loiter in
dim cloisters, losing ourselves in thought and in their glimmering
arches; a winding road before us seems as long as the journey of life,
and as full of events. Time and experience dissipate this illusion;
and by reducing them to detail, circumscribe the limits of our
expectations. It is only as the pageant of life passes by and the
masques turn their backs upon us, that we see through the deception,
or believe that the train will have an end. In many cases, the slow
progress and monotonous texture of our lives, before we mingle with
the world and are embroiled in its affairs, has a tendency to aid the
same feeling. We have a difficulty, when left to ourselves, and
without the resource of books or some more lively pursuit, to "beguile
the slow and creeping hours of time," and argue that if it moves on
always at this tedious snail's-pace, it can never come to an end. We
ar