["Reason and prudence, not a place with a commanding view of the
great ocean, banish care.”—­Horace, Ep., i. 2.]

ambition, avarice, irresolution, fear, and inordinate desires, do not leave us because we forsake our native country: 

“Et
Post equitem sedet atra cura;”

               ["Black care sits behind the horse man.” 
               —­Horace, Od., iii. 1, 40].

they often follow us even to cloisters and philosophical schools; nor deserts, nor caves, hair-shirts, nor fasts, can disengage us from them: 

“Haeret lateri lethalis arundo.”

["The fatal shaft adheres to the side.”—­AEneid, iv. 73.]

One telling Socrates that such a one was nothing improved by his travels:  “I very well believe it,” said he, “for he took himself along with him”

                   “Quid terras alio calentes
                    Sole mutamus? patriae quis exsul
                    Se quoque fugit?”

["Why do we seek climates warmed by another sun?  Who is the man
that by fleeing from his country, can also flee from himself?”
—­Horace, Od., ii. 16, 18.]

If a man do not first discharge both himself and his mind of the burden with which he finds himself oppressed, motion will but make it press the harder and sit the heavier, as the lading of a ship is of less encumbrance when fast and bestowed in a settled posture.  You do a sick man more harm than good in removing him from place to place; you fix and establish the disease by motion, as stakes sink deeper and more firmly into the earth by being moved up and down in the place where they are designed to stand.  Therefore, it is not enough to get remote from the public; ’tis not enough to shift the soil only; a man must flee from the popular conditions that have taken possession of his soul, he must sequester and come again to himself: 

                         “Rupi jam vincula, dicas
               Nam luctata canis nodum arripit; attamen illi,
               Quum fugit, a collo trahitur pars longa catenae.”

     ["You say, perhaps, you have broken your chains:  the dog who after
     long efforts has broken his chain, still in his flight drags a heavy
     portion of it after him.”—­Persius, Sat., v. 158.]

We still carry our fetters along with us.  ’Tis not an absolute liberty; we yet cast back a look upon what we have left behind us; the fancy is still full of it: 

          “Nisi purgatum est pectus, quae praelia nobis
          Atque pericula tunc ingratis insinuandum? 
          Quantae connscindunt hominem cupedinis acres
          Sollicitum curae? quantique perinde timores? 
          Quidve superbia, spurcitia, ac petulantia, quantas
          Efficiunt clades? quid luxus desidiesque?”