Yes, my dear friend, my son's happiness is the chief duty, and sole end of my life; this dear, and sacred interest, is the only one which animates me. I am going to satisfy your friendship, and I hope clear up your doubts. I am persuaded that a reserved man, who is confined in his ideas, can never be perfectly happy. He is not to be pitied, because he has no idea of a greater degree of happiness. But it is not less true, that the situation is like that of a mere vegetable, uniform and tiresome: he is deprived of those lively and numerous pleasures, which are reserved for men of superior talents. It is much less owing to our senses that we are happy, than to our ideas and reflections. During our sleep, dreams have a natural power over our minds to affect us as much, or more, than even reality can do. But observe, it is terror in particular which makes the strongest impressions, because the stupification we are under makes us still more susceptible; and pleasing dreams make only a trifling impression on our minds. Your dreams have a thousand times represented to you enchanted palaces, and hidden treasures, &c. &c. Did those things overjoy you, or did they ever give you the pleasure you feel at the first scene of an opera? No, surely; and why? Because your imagination is without activity, and you have neither understanding, nor the power of reflection. We say every day, ‘Happiness is mere matter of opinion, and he who thinks himself happy, in really so.’ The Savage, reduced to live in a desart without society, pleasures, or ideas, is then as happy as the enlightened Sage; whose life is made pleasing to him by study, by friendship, and by benevolence! It would be absurd to believe on to support such an argument.