The scoffing spirit that laughs at romance is an apple of
the Devil's own handing from the bitter tree of knowledge;--it opens the
eyes only to see eternal nakedness.
If ever you have had a romantic, uncalculating friendship,--a boundless
worship and belief in some hero of your soul,--if ever you have so
loved, that all cold prudence, all selfish worldly considerations have
gone down like drift-wood before a river flooded with new rain from
heaven, so that you even forgot yourself, and were ready to cast your
whole being into the chasm of existence, as an offering before the feet
of another, and all for nothing,--if you awoke bitterly betrayed and
deceived, still give thanks to God that you have had one glimpse of
heaven. The door now shut will open again. Rejoice that the noblest
capability of your eternal inheritance has been made known to you;
treasure it, as the highest honor of your being, that ever you could so
feel,--that so divine a guest ever possessed your soul.
By such experiences are we taught the pathos, the sacredness of life;
and if we use them wisely, our eyes will ever after be anointed to see
what poems, what romances, what sublime tragedies lie around us in the
daily walk of life, "written not with ink, but in fleshly tables of the
heart.
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