The commonplace world about us is not truly commonplace, since our fancy, still fresh from eternity, can transform three dusty shrubs into an enchanted forest, and an automobile into the most deliciously formidable of the Dragon Family.

A bit later, our pretending is done more cautiously.

We do not confess our shy flights of imagination: we take a prosaic outward pose, and try not to advertise the fact that our geese wear (to our eyes) swans' plumage, and that our individual roles are (to our own view) always those of heroes and heroines.

No one of us but mentally sees himself or herself doing something which is as impracticable as cloud-riding.

No one of us but dreams of the impossible and in a shamefaced, almost clandestine, fashion pictures it and lingers over it.