dieth not. Who knoweth the mysteries of the will,
with its vigor? For God is but a great will pervading all things by
nature of its intentness. Man doth not yield him to the angels, nor unto
death utterly, save only through the weakness of his feeble will."

Length of years, and subsequent reflection, have enabled me to trace,
indeed, some remote connection between this passage in the English
moralist and a portion of the character of Ligeia. An intensity in
thought, action, or speech, was possibly, in her, a result, or at least
an index, of that gigantic volition which, during our long intercourse,
failed to give other and more immediate evidence of its existence.
Of all the women whom I have ever known, she, the outwardly calm, the
ever-placid Ligeia, was the most violently a prey to the tumultuous
vultures of stern passion. And of such passion I could form no estimate,
save by the miraculous expansion of those eyes which at once so
delighted and appalled me--by the almost magical melody, modulation,
distinctness and placidity of her very low voice--and by the fierce
energy (rendered doubly effective by contrast with her manner of
utterance) of the wild words which she habitually uttered.

I have spoken of the learning of Ligeia: it was immense--such as I
have never known in woman. In the classical tongues was she deeply
proficient, and as far as my own acquaintance extended in regard to the
modern dialects of Europe, I have never known her at fault. Indeed upon
any theme of the most admired, because simply the most abstruse of the
boasted erudition of the academy, have I ever found Ligeia at fault? How
singularly--how thrillingly, this one point in the nature of my wife has
forced itself, at this late period only, upon my attention! I said her
knowledge was such as I have never known in woman--but where breathes
the man who has traversed, and successfully, all the wide areas of
moral, physical, and mathematical science? I saw not then what I now
clearly perceive, that the acquisitions of Ligeia were gigantic, were
astounding; yet I was sufficiently aware of her infinite supremacy to
resign myself, with a child-like confidence, to her guidance through the
chaotic world of metaphysical investigation at which I was most busily
occupied during the earlier years of our marriage. With how vast a
triumph--with how vivid a delight--with how much of all that is
ethereal in hope--did I feel, as she bent over me in studies but