ver be wholly free from him. Ever
was I controlled by a shadowy force which reached me from his abundant
power. No occupation was so absorbing as to protect me from the invading
presence of Herbert Vannelle.

* * * * *

The first Sunday of the present month brought the twentieth anniversary
of the day that I parted from Vannelle. In the morning I had preached a
written sermon on those solemn words of the Apostle, "Whatsoever is not
of faith is sin." For the first time I shrank from the consciousness
that the words uttered were true to me in a very different sense from
that in which the congregation received them. I found it difficult to
poise in tremulous balance between Truth and its available
representation to common men. It is my custom to preach extemporaneously
in the afternoon. Upon rising, after the introductory services, I could
perceive that my pulse and breathing were accelerated. A certain
numbness of the brain seemed pierced with convulsive, fugitive shocks.
An inexplicable influence, a command for cerebral sympathy, seemed
beating at my forehead. I turned the sacred pages before me, but could
find nothing upon which to base my remarks. But to my lips would come
incessantly a passage from Sir Thomas Browne. At last I gave it voice:--

"There are, as in philosophy, so in divinity, sturdy doubts and
boisterous objections wherewith the unhappiness of our knowledge too
nearly acquainteth us. More of these no man hath known than myself;
which I confess I conquered, not in martial attitude, but on my knees."

An extraordinary impetus seemed imparted to my mental powers. Men have
said that I spoke with a fluency and eloquence unknown to them before.
Indeed, I was conscious of a capacity to receive and convey such
portions of divine wisdom as corresponded to their needs. To speak in
figure, my heavenly race was as if the Lord of Evil pursued my soul.

Thoroughly exhausted by the effort, I returned to my study and threw
myself upon a sofa. More fully than ever before, I entered that state
where one far distant may make himself perceived and known. The occult
power of foreknowing events, the delicate perception of forbidden
things, worked their abnormal invigoration in the brain. I became
conscious that a carriage miles off was rolling nearer and nearer; I
knew that it would stop at my door. I waited, waited long into the
night. One by one went out the scattered village-lights. Anoth