A Tour Round the Baltic - Thro the Northern Countries of Europe #265842

It must likewise be confessed, that the survey of foreign nations, and the comparison of dissimilar modes of acting and thinking to our own, is not only formed to enlarge the human mind, and to correct its early prejudices; but, is calculated to delight in a supreme degree, as it has for its basis two passions most powerfully conducing to pleasure; novelty and admiration. So much, indeed, have travellers in all ages been conscious of this bias in nature, and so ready to take advantage of it, that the most improbable and ridiculous fictions have been invented and imposed upon the credulity of mankind. Recourse has been had to the marvellous, and the imagination has been entertained by amusing recitals of manners and actions which never existed.