g or slothful inactivity, as the result of doubt,
or he who, buoyant with faith and hope, encounters the gloom, and,
while longing for the dawn, is confident that it will come? But if
that sketch be a true one,--if the trial of which I have spoken be
necessary for you and for all, to develop and discipline those qualities
which alone will elicit and mature an Immortal Virtue, and secure to us
at last the privilege of indefectible 'children of God,'--then with
what feelings will you hear the Great Master say, 'In every other case
but this, you acted on the principles and maxims by which I taught
you (not obscurely) that I summoned you to act in this case also:
doubts and difficulties were necessary to you as to all, and I
exacted of you no more than were necessary ultimately to secure for
you an eternal exemption from them. But because you could not have
that certainty which the very necessity of the case excluded, you
declined the trial, and have accounted yourself unworthy of eternal
life!' Ah! how different if you could hear him say, 'It was indeed a
temptation; amidst numberless blessings denied to others, I yet
gave you, too, your trial;--the questionable talent of an inquisitive
intellect, and leisure to use or abuse it. Tempted to absolute doubt,
you would not succumb to it; you would not be so inconsistent here
as to relinquish those maxims on which I compelled you to act in
every other case in life, nor deny to ME the confidence which you
granted to every common friend! Warned by the very misery which was
sent to caution you that in that direction lay death, you struggled
against the incursions of your subtle foes, and you overcame. Welcome,
child of clay! welcome to that world in which there is no more NIGHT!'"

We had been talking on till long past midnight; and the lamp suddenly
warned us that its light was just expiring. Harrington took off the
shade, and was about to light a candle by the dying flame, when it
went out. "It matters not," he said, "I have the means of kindling a
light close at hand." "Let it alone," said I, rising, and gently laying
my hand on his arm, and speaking in a low voice, but with much
earnestness; "this darkness is an emblem of our present life. You
cannot see me, but you hear my voice and feel the touch of my hand. For
any thing you know, I may be seized with a sudden fit of insanity. I may
be about to stab you in this darkness; such things have been. You have
lost, with the light,