Authors, English -- 19th century -- Biography; De Quincey, Thomas, 1785-1859
flight; to a marriage festival as much as to a massacre; _agitation_ is
the nearest English word. This _trepidation_ increases both audibly and
visibly at every half mile, pretty much as one may suppose the roar of
Niagara and the thrilling of the ground to grow upon the senses in the
last ten miles of approach, with the wind in its favor, until at length
it would absorb and extinguish all other sounds whatsoever. Finally, for
miles before you reach a suburb of London such as Islington, for
instance, a last great sign and augury of the immensity which belongs
to the coming metropolis forces itself upon the dullest observer, in
the growing sense of his own utter insignificance. Every where else
in England, you yourself, horses, carriage, attendants, (if you travel
with any,) are regarded with attention, perhaps even curiosity; at all
events, you are seen. But after passing the final posthouse on every
avenue to London, for the latter ten or twelve miles, you become aware
that you are no longer noticed: nobody sees you; nobody hears you;
nobody regards you; you do not even regard yourself. In fact, how
should you, at the moment of first ascertaining your own total
unimportance in the sum of things?--a poor shivering unit in the
aggregate of human life. Now, for the first time, whatever manner of
man you were, or seemed to be, at starting, squire or "squireen," lord
or lordling, and however related to that city, hamlet, or solitary
house from which yesterday or to-day you slipped your cable, beyond
disguise you find yourself but one wave in a total Atlantic, one plant
(and a parasitical plant besides, needing alien props) in a forest of
America.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account