Distance, in truth, produces in idea the same effect as in real prospective.

Objects are softened, and rounded, and rendered doubly graceful; the harsher and more ordinary points of character are mellowed down, and those by which it is remembered are the more striking outlines that mark sublimity, grace, or beauty.

There are mists, too, in the mental, as well as the natural horizon, to conceal what is less pleasing in distant objects, and there are happy lights, to stream in full glory upon those points which can profit by brilliant illumination.
Waverley forgot Flora Mac-Ivor's prejudices in her magnanimity, and almost pardoned her indifference towards his affection, when he recollected the grand and decisive object which seemed to fill her whole soul.

She, whose sense of duty so wholly engrossed her in the cause of a benefactor,--what would be her feelings in favour of the happy individual who should be so fortunate as to awaken them?
Then came the doubtful question, whether he might not be that happy man,--a question which fancy endeavoured to answer in the affirmative, by conjuring up all she had said in his praise, with the addition of a comment much more flattering than the text warranted.

All that was commonplace--all that belonged to the everyday world--was melted away and obliterated in those dreams of imagination, which only remembered with advantage the points of grace and dignity that distinguished Flora, from the generality of her sex, not the particulars which she held in common with them, Edward was, in short, in the fair way of creating a goddess out of a high-spirited, accomplished, and beautiful young woman; and the time was wasted in castle-building, until, at the descent of a steep hill, he saw beneath him the market-town of--.
The Highland politeness of Callum Beg--there are few nations, by the way, who can boast of so much natural politeness as the Highlanders [The Highlander, in former times, had always a high idea, of his own gentility, and was anxious to impress the same upon those with whom he conversed.