reason why I should not have the
same thought, the same power of expression, to-morrow. What I write,
whilst I write it, seems the most natural thing in the world: but
yesterday I saw a dreary vacuity in this direction in which now I see
so much; and a month hence, I doubt not, I shall wonder who he was
that wrote so many continuous pages. Alas for this infirm faith, this
will not strenuous, this vast ebb of a vast flow! I am God in nature;
I am a weed by the wall.

The continual effort to raise himself above himself,[699] to work a
pitch above his last height, betrays itself in a man's relations. We
thirst for approbation, yet cannot forgive the approver. The sweet of
nature is love; yet if I have a friend I am tormented by my
imperfections. The love of me accuses the other party. If he were high
enough[700] to slight me, then could I love him, and rise by my
affection to new heights. A man's growth is seen in the successive
choirs of his friends. For every friend whom he loses for truth, he
gains a better. I thought as I walked in the woods and mused on any
friends, why should I play with them this game of idolatry? I know and
see too well, when not voluntarily blind, the speedy limits of persons
called high and worthy. Rich, noble and great they are by the
liberality of our speech, but truth is sad. O blessed Spirit, whom I
forsake for these, they are not thee! Every personal consideration
that we allow costs us heavenly state. We sell the thrones of angels
for a short and turbulent pleasure.

How often must we learn this lesson? Men cease to interest us when we
find their limitations. The only sin is limitation. As soon as you
once come up with a man's limitations, it is all over with him. Has
he talents? has he enterprises? has he knowledge? It boots not.
Infinitely alluring and attractive was he to you yesterday, a great
hope, a sea to swim in; now, you have found his shores, found it a
pond, and you care not if you never see it again.

Each new step we take in thought reconciles twenty seemingly
discordant facts, as expressions of one law. Aristotle and Plato[701]
are reckoned the respective heads of two schools. A wise man will see
that Aristotle platonizes. By going one step farther back in thought,
discordant opinions are reconciled by being seen to be two extremes of
one principle, and we can never go so far back as to preclude a still
higher vision.

Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on thi