y had brought woe and doom.

"Bless thee for this," exclaimed Zanoni, passionately, "and thou shalt
be blessed! What! couldst thou not perceive that at the entrance to all
the grander worlds dwell the race that intimidate and awe? Who in thy
daily world ever left the old regions of Custom and Prescription,
and felt not the first seizure of the shapeless and nameless Fear?
Everywhere around thee where men aspire and labour, though they see it
not,--in the closet of the sage, in the council of the demagogue, in
the camp of the warrior,--everywhere cowers and darkens the Unutterable
Horror. But there, where thou hast ventured, alone is the Phantom
VISIBLE; and never will it cease to haunt, till thou canst pass to the
Infinite, as the seraph; or return to the Familiar, as a child! But
answer me this: when, seeking to adhere to some calm resolve of virtue,
the Phantom hath stalked suddenly to thy side; when its voice hath
whispered thee despair; when its ghastly eyes would scare thee back to
those scenes of earthly craft or riotous excitement from which, as
it leaves thee to worse foes to the soul, its presence is ever
absent,--hast thou never bravely resisted the spectre and thine own
horror; hast thou never said, 'Come what may, to Virtue I will cling?'"

"Alas!" answered Glyndon, "only of late have I dared to do so."

"And thou hast felt then that the Phantom grew more dim and its power
more faint?"

"It is true."

"Rejoice, then!--thou hast overcome the true terror and mystery of the
ordeal. Resolve is the first success. Rejoice, for the exorcism is sure!
Thou art not of those who, denying a life to come, are the victims of
the Inexorable Horror. Oh, when shall men learn, at last, that if the
Great Religion inculcates so rigidly the necessity of FAITH, it is not
alone that FAITH leads to the world to be; but that without faith there
is no excellence in this,--faith in something wiser, happier, diviner,
than we see on earth!--the artist calls it the Ideal,--the priest,
Faith. The Ideal and Faith are one and the same. Return, O wanderer,
return! Feel what beauty and holiness dwell in the Customary and the
Old. Back to thy gateway glide, thou Horror! and calm, on the childlike
heart, smile again, O azure Heaven, with thy night and thy morning star
but as one, though under its double name of Memory and Hope!"

As he thus spoke, Zanoni laid his hand gently on the burning temples of
his excited and wondering listener; an