letter XXVIII

Do you think you are the only person to have had this experience? Are you really surprised, as if it were something unprecedented, that so long a tour and such diversity of scene have not enabled you to throw off this melancholy and this feeling of depression? A change of character, not a change of air, is what you need. Though you cross the boundless ocean, though, to use the words of our poet Virgil, lands and towns are left astern, whereever your destination you will be followed by your failings. Here is what Socrates said to someone who was making the same complaint: “How can you wonder your travels do you no good, when you carry yourself around with you? You are saddled with the very thing that drove you away.” How can novelty of surroundings abroad and becoming acquainted with foreign scenes or cities be of any help? All that dashing about turns out to be quite futile. And if you want to know why all this running away cannot help you, the answer is simply this: you are running away in your own company. You have to lay aside the load on your spirit. Until you do that, nowhere will satisfy you.
主要的意思也是改变自己而非改变周遭环境 face the problem 这样的意思 但没有找到那句诗“lands and towns left Astern”和挥之不去失败阴影的关联。