902. Time; Winter "The nakedness and asperity of the wintry world always fills the beholder with pensive and profound astonishment: as the variety of the scene is lessened, its grandeur is increased; and the mind is swelled at once by the mingled ideas of the present and the past, of the beauties which have vanished from the eyes, and the waste and desolation that are now before them." Johnson: Rambler #80 (December 22, 1750) Link 903. Spring; Winter "Spring is the season of gaiety, and winter of terror; in spring the heart of tranquillity dances to the melody of the groves, and the eye of benevolence sparkles at the sight of happiness and plenty: in the winter, compassion melts at universal calamity, and the tear of softness starts at the wailings of hunger and the cries of the creation in distress." Johnson: Rambler #80 (December 22, 1750) Link 904. Conviviality; Winter "The winter ... is generally celebrated as the proper season for domestic merriment and gaiety. We are seldom invited by the votaries of pleasure to look abroad for any other purpose than that we may shrink back with more satisfaction to our coverts, and when we have heard the howl of the tempest, and felt the gripe of the frost, congratulate each other with more gladness upon a close room, an easy chair, and a smoking dinner." Johnson: Rambler #80 (December 22, 1750) Link 906. Conviviality; Winter "The rigour of winter brings generally to the same fireside those who, by the opposition of inclinations, or differences of employment, moved in various directions through the various parts of the year; and when they have met, and find it their mutual interest to remain together, they endear each other by mutual continuance of the social season, with all its bleakness and all its severities." Johnson: Rambler #80 (December 22, 1750) Link