One great amusement of the household in the Castle of Indolence, on the testimony of its poet-laureate, was, “In a huge crystal magic globe to spy, Still as you turned it, all things that do pass Upon this ant-hill earth; where constantly Of idly busy men the restless fry Run bustling to and fro with foolish haste, In search of pleasures vain that from them fly, Or which, obtained, the caitiffs do not taste.” If, with Churchill, we stand as “Spectators only on this bustling stage, We see what vain designs mankind engage: Vice after vice with ardour they pursue, And one old folly brings forth twenty new.... Squirrels for nuts contend, and, wrong or right, For the world’s empire, kings, ambitious, fight. What odds?—to us ’tis all the selfsame thing, A nut, a world, a squirrel, and a king.” In other verses, and another measure, the same poet justifies his use of the expression “whatever shadows we pursue,” by the interpolated comment, “For our pursuits, be what they will, Are little more than shadows still; Too swift they fly, too swift and strong, For man to catch or hold them long.” Of world-wide application is what Bernardin de Saint-Pierre said of himself, by way of private interpretation: “Toutes mes idées ne sont que des ombres de la nature, recueillies par une autre ombre.” Goldsmith was not altogether in sport when he made Croaker in the comedy pronounce life to be, at the greatest and best, but a froward child, that must be humoured and coaxed a little till it falls asleep, and then all the care is over; while Honeywood assents—Good-natured Man that he is—with a ready “Very true, sir; nothing can exceed the vanity of our existence, but the folly of our pursuits.” For Goldsmith was in sad earnest when he wrote of himself as one “Impelled with steps unceasing to pursue Some fleeting good that mocks me with the view That like the circle bounding earth and skies, Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies.”