Chapter 15
Such was the history of my beloved cottagers. It impressed me deeply.
I learned, from the views of social life which it developed, to admire
their virtues and to deprecate the vices of mankind.
As yet I looked upon crime as a distant evil, benevolence and
generosity were ever present before me, inciting within me a desire to
become an actor in the busy scene where so many admirable qualities
were called forth and displayed. But in giving an account of the
progress of my intellect, I must not omit a circumstance which occurred
in the beginning of the month of August of the same year.
One night during my accustomed visit to the neighbouring wood where I
collected my own food and brought home firing for my protectors, I found on
the ground a leathern portmanteau containing several articles of dress and
some books. I eagerly seized the prize and returned with it to my hovel.
Fortunately the books were written in the language, the elements of which I
had acquired at the cottage; they consisted of _Paradise Lost_, a volume
of _Plutarch s Lives_, and the _Sorrows of Werter_. The
possession of these treasures gave me extreme delight; I now continually
studied and exercised my mind upon these histories, whilst my friends were
employed in their ordinary occupations.
I can hardly describe to you the effect of these books. They produced
in me an infinity of new images and feelings, that sometimes raised me
to ecstasy, 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
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