ercome and achieve.
As the life of a new hope filled our hearts, we remembered with a
sudden pain the world out of which we had escaped, where every one
hides his weakness lest it feed a vulgar curiosity, and conceals his
defeats lest they be used to destroy rather than to build him up.

With what delight did we find that in Arden the talk touched only great
themes, in a spirit of beautiful candour and unaffected earnestness!
To have exchanged the small personal talk from which we had often been
unable to escape for this simple, sincere discourse on the things that
were of common interest was like exchanging the cloud-enveloped lowland
for some sunny mountain slope, where every breath was vital and one
mused on half a continent spread out at his feet. There is no food for
the soul but truth, and we were filled with a mighty hunger when we
understood for how long a time we had been but half fed. A new
strength came to us, and with it an openness of mind and a
responsiveness of heart that made life an inexhaustible joy. We were
set free from the weariness of old struggles to make ourselves
understood; we were no longer perplexed with doubts about the reality
of our ideas; we had but to speak the thought that was in us, and to
live fearlessly and joyously in the hour that was before us. Frank
speaking, absolute candour, that would once have wounded, now only
cheered and stimulated; the spirit of entire helpfulness drives out all
morbid self-consciousness. Differences no longer embitter when
courtesy and faith are universal possessions.

There is nothing more sacred than friendship, and it is impossible to
profane it by drawing the veil from its ministries. The charm of a
perfectly noble companionship between two souls is as real as the
perfume of a flower, and as impossible to convey by word or speech;
Nature has made its sanctity inviolable by making it forever impossible
of revelation and transference. I cannot translate into any language
the delicate charm, the inexhaustible variety, the noble fidelity to
truth, the vigour and splendour of thought, the unfailing sympathy, of
our Arden friendships; they are a part of the Forest, and one must seek
them there. It would vulgarise these fellowships to catalogue the
great names, always familiar to us, and yet which gained another and a
better familiarity when they ceased to recall famous persons and became
associated with those who sat at our hearthstone or gathered