“I don’t like people who have their itineraries and ideas so clearly sorted out that they say, ‘Today I’ll make three visits, I’ll write four letters, and I’ll finish that book I started.’ My soul is so open to every kind of idea, taste and sentiment; it so avidly receives everything that presents itself!… And why would it turn down the pleasures that are scattered along life’s difficult path? They are so few and far between, so thin on the ground, that you’d need to be mad not to stop, and even turn away from your path, and pick up all of those that lie within reach. There’s no more attractive pleasure, in my view, than following one’s ideas wherever they lead, as the hunter pursues his game, without even trying to keep to any set route.”
—Xavier de Maistre, A Journey Around My Room (1794)
(Via Michael Leddy)
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