Thus, my dear Foley, for want of something better
we have recourse to ourselves, and strike out the best amusements we
can from such materials." "Recourse to ourselves," however, means,
in strict accuracy, "recourse to each other;" and when the amateur
players had played themselves out, and exhausted their powers of
contributing to each others' amusement, it is probable that
"recourse to ourselves," in the exact sense of the phrase, was found
ineffective--in Sterne's case, at any rate--to stave off _ennui_.
To him, with his copiously if somewhat oddly furnished mind, and his
natural activity of imagination, one could hardly apply the line of
Persius,
"Tecum habita et noris quam sit tibi curta supellex;"
but it is yet evident enough that Sterne's was one of that numerous
order of intellects which are the convivial associates, rather than
the fireside companions, of their owners, and which, when deprived
of the stimulus of external excitement, are apt to become very dull
company indeed. Nor does he seem to have obtained much diversion of
mind from his literary work--a form of intellectual enjoyment which,
indeed, more often presupposes than begets good spirits in such
temperaments as his.
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