than any other on this side barbarism, the
whole field of morals being taken into the view. As long as travellers
continue to neglect the safe means of generalization which are within
the reach of all, and build theories upon the manifestations of
individual minds, there is little hope of inspiring men with that spirit
of impartiality, mutual deference, and love, which are the best
enlighteners of the eyes and rectifiers of the understanding.

Above all things, the traveller must not despair of good results from
his observations. Because he cannot establish true conclusions by
imperfect means, he is not to desist from doing anything at all. Because
he cannot safely generalize in one way, it does not follow that there is
no other way. There are methods of safe generalization of which I shall
speak by-and-by. But, if there were not such within his reach, if his
only materials were the discourse, the opinions, the feelings, the way
of life, the looks, dress, and manners of individuals, he might still
afford important contributions to science by his observations on as wide
a variety of these as he can bring within his mental grasp. The
experience of a large number of observers would in time yield materials
from which a cautious philosopher might draw conclusions. It is a safe
rule, in morals as in physics, that no fact is without its use. Every
observer and recorder is fulfilling a function; and no one observer or
recorder ought to feel discouragement, as long as he desires to be
useful rather than shining; to be the servant rather than the lord of
science, and a friend to the home-stayers rather than their dictator.

One of the wisest men living writes to me, "No books are so little to be
trusted as travels. All travellers do and must generalize too rapidly.
Most, if not all, take a fact for a principle, or the exception for the
rule, more or less; and the quickest minds, which love to reason and
explain more than to observe with patience, go most astray. My faith in
travels received a mortal wound when I travelled. I read, as I went
along, the books of those who had preceded me, and found that we did not
see with the same eyes. Even descriptions of nature proved false. The
traveller had viewed the prospect at a different season, or in a
different light, and substituted the transient for the fixed. Still I
think travels useful. Different accounts give means of approximation to
truth; and by-and-by what is fixed and essenti