ed to me by one of
the wire-operators,--though I have forgotten it,--and it is possible,
that, in my semi-mesmeric condition, the recollection revived, so that
I knew that such and such pulsations of the wire stood for such and
such letters.

But is there not a certain spiritual significance, also, in these
singular experiences here related?

We may safely lay down this doctrine,--a very old and much-thumbed
doctrine, but none the less true for all its dog-ears:--No man lives
for himself alone. He is related not only to the silent stars and the
singing-birds and the sunny landscape, but to every other human soul.
You say, This should not be stated so sermonically, but symbolically.
That is just what I have been doing in my narrative of the wires.

It gives one a great idea of human communion,--this power of sending
these spark-messages thousands of miles in a second. Far more
poetical, too,--is it not?--as well as more practical, than tying
billets under the wings of carrier-pigeons. It is removing so much
time and space out of the way,--those absorbents of spirits,--and
bringing mind into close contact with mind. But when one can read
these messages without the aid of machinery, by merely touching the
wires, how much greater does the symbol become!

All mankind are one. As some philosophers express it,--one great mind
includes us all. But then, as it would never do for all minds to be
literally one, any more than it would for all magnetisms to be
identical in their modes of manifestation, or for all the rivers,
creeks, and canals to flow together, so we have our natural barriers
and channels, our _propriums_, as the Swedish seer has it,--and so we
live and let live. We feel with others and think with others, but with
strict reservations. That evening among the wires, for instance,
brought me into wonderful intimate contact with a few of the joys and
sorrows of some of my fellow-beings; but an excess of such experiences
would interfere with our freedom and our happiness. It is our
self-hood, properly balanced, which constitutes our dignity, our
humanity. A certain degree, and a very considerable degree of
insulation is necessary, that individual life and mental equanimity
may go on.

But there may be a degree of insulation which is unbecoming a member
of the human family. It may become brutish,--or it may amount to the
ridiculous. In Paris, there was an old lady, of uncertain age, who
lived in the apartment benea