These are among the evils which an irrational solitude is capable of producing upon an unrestrained and misdirected imagination; but I do not mean to contend indiscriminately, that solitude is generally to be considered as dangerous to the free indulgence of this delightful faculty of the mind. Solitude, well chosen, and rationally pursued, is so far from being either the open enemy, or the treacherous friend of a firm and fine imagination, that it ripens its earliest shoots, strengthens their growth, and contributes to the production of its richest and most valuable fruits. To him who has acquired the happy art of enjoying in solitude the charms of nature, and of indulging the powers of fancy without impairing the faculty of reason … Whate’er adorns The princely dome, the column, and the arch, The breathing marble, and the sculptured gold, Beyond the proud possessor’s narrow claim, His happy breast enjoys. For him the spring Distils her dews, and from the silken gem Its lucid leaves unfolds: for him the hand Of autumn tinges every fertile branch With blooming gold, and blushes like the morn. Each passing hour sheds tribute from her wings; And still new beauties meet his lonely walk, And loves unfelt attract him. Not a breeze Flies o’er the meadow; not a cloud imbibes The setting sun’s effulgence; not a strain From all the tenants of the warbling shade Ascends, but whence his bosom can partake Fresh pleasure, unreproved. Nor thence partake Fresh pleasure only: for the attentive mind, By this harmonious action on her powers, Becomes herself harmonious. CHAPTER V. _The effects of solitude on a melancholy mind._ A disposition to enjoy the silence of sequestered solitude, and a glowing distaste of the noisy tumults of public life, are the earliest and most general symptoms of approaching melancholy. The heart, on which felicity was used to sit enthroned, becomes senseless to the touch of pleasure; the airy wing of high delight sinks prostrate to the earth on broken pinions: and care and anxiety, chagrin, and regret, load the mind with distempering ideas, and render it cheerless and forlorn. The dawning sun, and heaven lighted day, give no pleasure to the sickened senses of the unhappy sufferer. His only pleasure is to “commune with his own griefs;” and for this purpose he seeks some gloomy glen, “Where bitter boding melancholy reigns O’er heavy sighs and care disordered thoughts.”