But I diverge a little in these comments from my present business of
classifying motives.
Next I perceive hypertrophied in myself and many sympathetic human
beings a passion that many animals certainly possess, the beautiful and
fearless cousin of fear, Curiosity, that seeks keenly for knowing and
feeling. Apart from appetites and bodily desires and blind impulses, I
want most urgently to know and feel, for the sake of knowing and
feeling. I want to go round corners and see what is there, to cross
mountain ranges, to open boxes and parcels. Young animals at least have
that disposition too. For me it is something that mingles with all my
desires. Much more to me than the desire to live is the desire to taste
life. I am not happy until I have done and felt things. I want to get as
near as I can to the thrill of a dog going into a fight or the delight
of a bird in the air. And not simply in the heroic field of war and the
air do I want to understand. I want to know something of the jolly
wholesome satisfaction that a hungry pig must find in its wash. I want
to get the quintessence of that.
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