 ecstacy, but
more frequently sunk me into the lowest dejection. In the Sorrows of Werter,
besides the interest of its simple and affecting story, so many opinions are
canvassed, and so many lights thrown upon what had hitherto been to me obscure
subjects, that I found in it a never-ending source of speculation and
astonishment. The gentle and domestic manners it described, combined with lofty
sentiments and feelings, which had for their object something out of self,
accorded well with my experience among my protectors, and with the wants which
were for ever alive in my own bosom. But I thought Werter himself a more divine
being than I had ever beheld or imagined; his character contained no pretension,
but it sunk deep. The disquisitions upon death and suicide were calculated to
fill me with wonder. I did not pretend to enter into the merits of the case, yet
I inclined towards the opinions of the hero, whose extinction I wept, without
precisely understanding it.
    As I read, however, I applied much personally to my own feelings and
condition. I found myself similar, yet at the same time strangely unlike to the
beings concerning whom I read, and to whose conversation I was a listener. I
sympathised with, and partly understood them, but I was unformed in mind; I was
dependent on none, and related to none. The path of my departure was free; and
there was none to lament my annihilation. My person was hideous, and my stature
gigantic: what did this mean? Who was I? What was I? Whence did I come? What was
my destination? These questions continually recurred, but I was unable to solve
them.
    The volume of Plutarch's Lives, which I possessed, contained the histories
of the first founders of the ancient republics. This book had a far different
effect upon me from the Sorrows of Werter. I learned from Werter's imaginations
despondency and gloom: but Plutarch taught me high thoughts; he elevated me
above the wretched sphere of my own reflections, to admire and love the heroes
of past ages. Many things I read surpassed my understanding and experience. I
had a very confused knowledge of kingdoms, wide extents of country, mighty
rivers, and boundless seas. But I was perfectly unacquainted with towns, and
large assemblages of men. The cottage of my protectors had been the only school
in which I had studied human nature; but this book developed new and mightier
scenes of action. I read of men concerned in public affairs, governing or
massacring their species. I felt the greatest ardour for virtue rise within
