ected solution. It was chiefly relief,
although a sad relief, I felt.... And with the absorbing work of the
next following years (I took up my appointment within six months of
her death) her memory, already swiftly fading, entered an oblivion
whence rarely, and at long intervals only, it emerged at all. In the
ordinary meaning of the phrase, I had forgotten her. You will see,
therefore, that there was no desire in me to revive an unhappy
memory, least of all to establish any fancied communication with one
before whose generous love I had felt myself dishonoured, if not
actually disgraced. Even the remorse and regret had long since failed
to disturb my peace of mind, causing me no anxiety, much less pain.
Sic transit was the epitaph, if any. Acute sensation I had none at
all. This, then, plainly argues against the slightest predisposition
on my part to imagine that the loving guidance so strangely given
owned a personal origin I could recognize. That it involved a
"personal emotion" is quite another matter.

The more remarkable, therefore, is the statement truth now compels me
to confess to you--namely, that this origin is recognizable, and that
I have traced in part the name it owns to. My next sentence you
divine already; you at once suspect the name I mean. I hear you say
to yourself with a smile--"So, after all...!"

Please, wait a moment, and listen closely now; for, in reply to your
suspicion, I can give neither full affirmation or full denial. Yet an
answer of a certain kind is ready: I have stated my firm conviction
that the dead do not return; I do not modify it one iota; but I
mentioned a moment ago another conviction that is mine because I know.
So now let me supplement these two statements with a third: the dead,
though they do not return, are active; and those who lived beauty in
their lives are--benevolently active.

This may prepare you for a further assurance, yet one less easy to
express intelligibly. Be patient while I make the difficult attempt.

The origin of the wisdom that now seeks to shape and guide my life
through Beauty is, indeed, not Marion, but a power that stands behind
her, and through which, with which, the energy of her being acts. It
stood behind her while she lived. It stands behind not only her, but
equally behind all those peerless, exquisite manifestations of self-less
love that give bountifully of their best without hope or expectation of
reward in kind. No human love of this de