fretting against this, partly involuntary
and, as he confesses, partly voluntary also, "disturbs my health and
reduces my strength."

Next to the evil self-company of an unforgiven sinner there is no
loneliness so sad as that of the invalid. He needs company most who
is worst company for himself. Yet Father Hecker has not left a single
word which would suggest that during more than two years of absence
from all his life associates in religion, as well as from his blood
kindred, whom he loved with a powerful love, he felt the lack of
human companionship. One reason for this was his contemplative
nature, and this was the main reason. He was born to be a hermit, and
was an active liver only by being born again for a special vocation.
Another reason was that his mind was so constituted that, when
subjected to trial, it rested better when quite out of sight of
everybody and everything associated with past responsibilities. He
bade adieu to Father Deshon when the latter left him at Ragatz with
sorrow, but without reluctance; and when a year afterwards at was
suggested that one of the community should come to Europe and keep
him company, he refused without hesitation, saying that his companion
would be burdened with a sick man's infirmities, or the sick man
distressed by his companion's inactivity on his account. But towards
the very end of his life there were times when he felt the need of
congenial company and was extremely grateful for it. But this did not
happen often, and when it did it was because the waves of despondency
which submerged him were heavier and darker than usual.

The following extract from a letter shows this state of mind:

"As I get somewhat more accustomed to my separation from all that was
so dear to me, the strangeness of my position seems to me more and
more inexplicable. All the things which are going on in Fifty-ninth
Street were once all to me, and nothing appeared beyond. To be
separated from all; to look upon one's past as a dream; to become a
stranger to one's self, wandering from city to city, from country to
country, ever in a strange land and among strangers; to be attached
to nothing; to see no definite future; to be an enigma to one's self;
to find no light in any one to guide me, isolated from all except
God--who will explain what all this means? where it will end? and how
soon? As I become resigned to this state of things my health suffers
less. Occasionally my interior trials and st