lying still, knew, by the sound of the waters, that my little bark was
fleeting rapidly onwards. Finding, however, none of that stormy motion
which the sea had manifested when I beheld it from the shore, I opened
my eyes; and, looking first up, saw above me the deep violet sky of a
warm southern night; and then, lifting my head, saw that I was sailing
fast upon a summer sea, in the last border of a southern twilight. The
aureole of the sun yet shot the extreme faint tips of its longest rays
above the horizon-waves, and withdrew them not. It was a perpetual
twilight. The stars, great and earnest, like children's eyes, bent down
lovingly towards the waters; and the reflected stars within seemed to
float up, as if longing to meet their embraces. But when I looked down,
a new wonder met my view. For, vaguely revealed beneath the wave, I
floated above my whole Past. The fields of my childhood flitted by; the
halls of my youthful labours; the streets of great cities where I had
dwelt; and the assemblies of men and women wherein I had wearied myself
seeking for rest. But so indistinct were the visions, that sometimes
I thought I was sailing on a shallow sea, and that strange rocks and
forests of sea-plants beguiled my eye, sufficiently to be transformed,
by the magic of the phantasy, into well-known objects and regions. Yet,
at times, a beloved form seemed to lie close beneath me in sleep; and
the eyelids would tremble as if about to forsake the conscious eye;
and the arms would heave upwards, as if in dreams they sought for a
satisfying presence. But these motions might come only from the heaving
of the waters between those forms and me. Soon I fell asleep, overcome
with fatigue and delight. In dreams of unspeakable joy--of restored
friendships; of revived embraces; of love which said it had never died;
of faces that had vanished long ago, yet said with smiling lips that
they knew nothing of the grave; of pardons implored, and granted with
such bursting floods of love, that I was almost glad I had sinned--thus
I passed through this wondrous twilight. I awoke with the feeling that I
had been kissed and loved to my heart's content; and found that my boat
was floating motionless by the grassy shore of a little island.

CHAPTER XIX

"In still rest, in changeless simplicity, I bear,
uninterrupted, the consciousness of the whole of Humanity
within me."--SCHLEIERMACHERS, Monologen.

"... such a s