Page:Winter - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/411

Rh do not look for those clear sparkling mornings and delicate leaf frosts which seem to belong to the earlier part of the winter, as if the air were now somewhat tarnished and debauched, had lost its virgin purity.

Every judgment and action of a man qualifies every other, i. e., corrects our estimation of every other, as, for instance, a man's idea of immortality who is a member of a church, or his praise of you coupled with his praise of those whom you do not esteem. For, in this sense, a man is awfully consistent above his own consciousness. All a man's strength and all his weakness go to make up the authority of any particular opinion which he may utter. If he is your friend, you may have to consider that he loves you, but perchance he also loves gingerbread.

Columella, after saying that many authors had believed that the climate, qualitatem cœli statumque, was changed by lapse of time, longo ævi situ, refers to Hipparchus as having given out that the time would be when the poles of the earth would be moved from their places, tempus fore quo cardines mundi loco moverentur; and as confirmatory of this, he, Columella, goes on to say that the vine and olive flourish now in some places where formerly they failed. He gives the names of about fifty authors who had treated de rusticis rebus before him.