"There is no land where man cannot dwell,--no land where he cannot
uplift his eyes to heaven; wherever we are, the distance of the divine
from the human remains the same. So then, as long as my eyes are not
robbed of that spectacle with which they cannot be satiated, so long as
I may look upon the sun and moon, and fix my lingering gaze on the other
constellations, and consider their rising and setting and the spaces
between them and the causes of their less and greater speed,--while I
may contemplate the multitude of stars glittering throughout the heaven,
some stationary, some revolving, some suddenly blazing forth, others
dazzling the gaze with a flood of fire as though they fell, and others
leaving over a long space their trails of light; while I am in the midst
of such phenomena, and mingle myself, as far as a man may, with things
celestial,--while my soul is ever occupied in contemplations so sublime
as these, what matters it what ground I tread?
"What though fortune has thrown me where the most magnificent abode is
but a cottage? the humblest cottage, if it be but the home of virtue,
may be more beautiful than all temples; no place is narrow which can
contain the crowd of glorious virtues; no exile severe into which you
may go with such a reliance.
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