Swann's Way

other.

So the 'Méséglise way' and the 'Guermantes way' remain for me linked
with many of the little incidents of that one of all the divers lives
along whose parallel lines we are moved, which is the most abundant in
sudden reverses of fortune, the richest in episodes; I mean the life of
the mind. Doubtless it makes in us an imperceptible progress, and the
truths which have changed for us its meaning and its aspect, which have
opened new paths before our feet, we had for long been preparing for
their discovery; but that preparation was unconscious; and for us
those truths date only from the day, from the minute when they became
apparent. The flowers which played then among the grass, the water
which rippled past in the sunshine, the whole landscape which served as
environment to their apparition lingers around the memory of them still
with its unconscious or unheeding air; and, certainly, when they were
slowly scrutinised by this humble passer-by, by this dreaming
child--as the face of a king is scrutinised by a petitioner lost in the
crowd--that scrap of nature, that corner of a garden could never suppose
that it would be thanks to him that they would be elected to survive in