Mere defect of power, _as_ such, and where circumstances force it into violent relief, cannot well be other than a degrading feature in any man's position. Now, in other cities, the man of £100 a-year never can be forced into such an invidious insulation--he finds many to keep him in countenance; but in Oxford he is a sort of monster--he stands alone in the only class with which he can be compared. So that the pressure upon Oxford predispositions to contempt is far stronger than elsewhere; and, consequently, there would be more allowance due, if the actual contempt were also stronger--which I deny. But, no doubt, in every climate, and under all meridians, it must be humiliating to be distinguished by pure defect. Now and for ever, to be weak is in some sense to be miserable; and simple poverty, without other qualification or adjunct, is merely defect of power. But, on the other hand, in Oxford, at least, as much as in any other place I ever knew, talents and severe habits of study are their own justification. And upon the strongest possible warrant, viz., my own experience in a college then recently emerging from habits of riotous dissipation, I can affirm that a man who pleads known habits of study as his reason for secluding himself, and for declining the ordinary amusements and wine parties, will meet with neither molestation nor contempt.[3] [3] This paragraph is omitted in the American reprint of the _Tait_ paper, probably because it repeats information given already. See the chapter entitled "The Priory, Chester," in Vol. I, and especially the concluding pages of that chapter. As, however, the paragraph contains some new particulars, and explains what follows, I have retained it, the rather because it ought to be the rule not to tamper with De Quincey's text on any such occasion.--M.