Just in this one matter lies the main charm of life in Europe—comfort.
In America, we hurry—which is well; but when the day’s work is done, we
go on thinking of losses and gains, we plan for the morrow, we even
carry our business cares to bed with us, and toss and worry over them
when we ought to be restoring our racked bodies and brains with sleep.
We burn up our energies with these excitements, and either die early or
drop into a lean and mean old age at a time of life which they call a
man’s prime in Europe. When an acre of ground has produced long and
well, we let it lie fallow and rest for a season; we take no man clear
across the continent in the same coach he started in—the coach is
stabled somewhere on the plains and its heated machinery allowed to cool
for a few days; when a razor has seen long service and refuses to hold
an edge, the barber lays it away for a few weeks, and the edge comes
back of its own accord. We bestow thoughtful care upon inanimate
objects, but none upon ourselves. What a robust people, what a nation of
thinkers we might be, if we would only lay ourselves on the shelf
occasionally, and renew our edges!
I do envy these Europeans the comfort they take. When the work of the
day is done, they forget it.