ither piercing or
steady, and whose ample foreheads, with the weighty bar, ridge-like,
above the eyebrows, bespoke observation followed by meditative
thought, and a much larger number who were enraged by the severity and
insolence of the priests in exacting their offerings, had collected in
one tumultuous group, and with a confused outcry of 'This is the
Temple of Superstition!' after much contumely, and turmoil, and cruel
mal-treatment on all sides, rushed out of the pile: and I, methought,
joined them.

"We speeded from the temple with hasty steps, and had now nearly gone
round half the valley, when we were addressed by a woman, tall beyond
the stature of mortals, and with a something more than human in her
countenance and mien, which yet could by mortals be only felt, not
conveyed by words or intelligibly distinguished. Deep reflection,
animated by ardent feelings, was displayed in them; and hope, without
its uncertainty, and a something more than all these, which I
understood not; but which yet seemed to blend all these into a divine
unity of expression. Her garments were white and matronly, and of the
simplest texture. We inquired her name. My name, she replied, is
Religion.

"The more numerous part of our company, affrighted by the very sound,
and sore from recent impostures or sorceries, hurried onwards and
examined no farther. A few of us, struck by the manifest opposition of
her form and manner to those of the living Idol, whom we had so
recently abjured, agreed to follow her, though with cautious
circumspection. She led us to an eminence in the midst of the valley,
from the top of which we could command the whole plain, and observe
the relation of the different parts, of each to the other, and of each
to the whole, and of all to each. She then gave us an optic glass
which assisted without contradicting our natural vision, and enabled
us to see far beyond the limits of the Valley of Life; though our eye
even thus assisted permitted us only to behold a light and a glory,
but what we could not descry, save only that it _was_, and that it was
most glorious.

"And now, with the rapid transition of a dream, I had overtaken and
rejoined the more numerous party, who had abruptly left us, indignant
at the very name of religion. They journeyed on, goading each other
with remembrances of past oppressions, and never looking back, till in
the eagerness to recede from the Temple of Superstition they had
rounded the who