Excerpt from Autumn Hours, and Fireside Reading<br><br>For how hard it is to pierce or to surmount that semi-trans parent wall of personality, which can only be sapped by long and intimate intercourse, and never thrown down even by that 1 What is it that keeps us apart, when each would fain meet the other? Here, In these delicious shades where we are writing, with earth, air, and sky preaching love and harmony, numbers of human beings, every one more or less alive to the beauties Of scenery and the softening influence of agreeable circum stances, pass each other, daily and hourly, with scarce a look or word of recognition, though there is nothing but good will, or, at worst, indifference, among them. But if by chance there be one among them who has spoken to the world through a book, that one is felt as an acquaintance; the mind-portrait having had a wide circulation, no introduction seems needed. Here, then, is an excuse for books - one of many.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.