characters, and her ardent veneration for
them. This drew them gratefully to her in return. She had an almost
idolatrous admiration for Goethe. All aspirants for true interior
greatness naturally love and revere those who exemplify their ideal
to them. She once called Goethe and Fichte the first and second eyes
of Germany. A soul capable of such enthusiasm for great souls is
rare, and is most charming. Her maxim, like that of all the highest
and strongest of the guiding souls of our race, was, "Act only from
your inmost conscience, and only good will come to you." A vast,
tonic freedom and charity breathe in some of her sentences. "A
catholic sympathy with all possible systems; a resolute liberation
from the exclusive trammels of any; an entire surrender into the
hands of Him who wields all possibilities; and an honest dealing with
the depths of our own hearts, this seems to me more than all
philosophy, and a thing well pleasing to God."

It is no wonder that the favored friends of such a woman honored her
even to the verge of worship, as we find then doing in their letters.
Though not technically--or professedly a religious woman, she was
really one. She felt the mystery of things; she revered the
providential guides of the race; she owned the law of the whole; she
bowed in submissive adoration before God. "Since the decease of my
mother," she said, "I know death better. I see him everywhere. He has
assumed a new power over me." A fatal disease struck her at sixty-
two. Her husband scarcely left her bedside. Until the last, he
continued to read her favorite books to her. The young Heine, how
different then from the dreadful wreck he became! hearing that fresh
rose-leaves, applied to her inflamed eyes, were grateful, sent her
his first hook of poems, enveloped in a basket of roses. With what
fitter words can we take leave of Rahel and her friends than these of
her own: "I have thought an epitaph. It is this, Good men, when any
thing good happens to mankind, then think affectionately in your
peace also of mine."

The life of Madame Recamier is interesting, in a pre-eminent degree,
on account of the warmth, elevation, and fidelity of the friendships
which filled it. Her personal loveliness and social charm made her a
universal favorite, and gave her an unparalleled celebrity. But, full
as her career was of romantic adventures, rich as it was in brilliant
associations, its keynote throughout, its strongest interest at ev