“Authors—­the creators of opinion.”

“What appear to be calamities are often the sources of fortune.”

“Change is inevitable in a progressive country.  Change is constant.”  ("Then why,” was my recorded comment, “cannot the changes I propose to bring about, be brought about?”)

“The author is, as we must ever remember, of peculiar organization.  He is a being born with a predisposition which with him is irresistible, the bent of which he cannot in any way avoid, whether it directs him to the abstruse researches of erudition or induces him to mount into the fervid and turbulent atmosphere of imagination.”

“This,” I wrote (the day after arriving at the hospital) “is a fair diagnosis of my case as it stands to-day, assuming, of course, that an author is one who loves to write, and can write with ease, even though what he says may have no literary value.  My past proves that my organization is a peculiar one.  I have for years (two and a half) had a desire to achieve success along literary lines.  I believe that, feeling as I do to-day, nothing can prevent my writing.  If I had to make a choice at once between a sure success in the business career ahead of me and doubtful success in the field of literature, I would willingly, yes confidently, choose the latter.  I have read many a time about successful writers who learned how to write, and by dint of hard work ground out their ideas.  If these men could succeed, why should not a man who is in danger of being ground up by an excess of ideas and imagination succeed, when he seems able to put those ideas into fairly intelligible English?  He should and will succeed.”

Therefore, without delay, I began the course of experiment and practice which culminated within a few months in the first draft of my story.  Wise enough to realize the advantages of a situation free from the annoying interruptions of the workaday world, I enjoyed a degree of liberty seldom experienced by those in possession of complete legal liberty and its attendant obligations.  When I wished to read, write, talk, walk, sleep, or eat, I did the thing I wished.  I went to the theatre when the spirit moved me to do so, accompanied, of course, by an attendant, who on such occasions played the role of chum.

Friends called to see me and, at their suggestion or mine, invited me to dinner outside the walls of my “cloister.”  At one of these dinners an incident occurred which throws a clear light on my condition at the time.  The friend, whose willing prisoner I was, had invited a common friend to join the party.  The latter had not heard of my recent commitment.  At my suggestion, he who shared my secret had agreed not to refer to it unless I first broached the subject.  There was nothing strange in the fact that we three should meet.  Just such impromptu celebrations had before occurred among us.  We dined, and, as friends will, indulged in that exchange of thoughts which bespeaks intimacy.  During our talk, I so shaped the conversation that the possibility of a recurrence of my mental illness was discussed.  The uninformed friend derided the idea.