The Missionary: An Indian Tale; vol. II Read online

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  THE MISSIONARY:

  AN Indian Tale.

  BY MISS OWENSON.

  WITH A PORTRAIT OF THE AUTHOR.

  IN THREE VOLUMES.

  _FOURTH EDITION._

  VOL. II.

  LONDON: PRINTED FOR J. J. STOCKDALE, NO. 41, PALL MALL. 1811.

  THE MISSIONARY, &c.

  CHAPTER VIII.

  It was the season of visitation of the Guru of Cashmire to hisgranddaughter. The Missionary beheld him with his train approach herabode of peace, and felt the necessity of absenting himself from theconsecrated grove, where he might risk a discovery of his intentionsunfavourable to their success. He knew that the conversion of theBrachmachira was only to be effected by the frequent habit of seeingand conversing with her, and that a discovery of their interviews wouldbe equally fatal to both. Yet he submitted to the necessity whichseparated them, with an impatience, new to a mind, whose firm tenourwas, hitherto, equal to stand the shock of the severest disappointment.Still did his steps involuntarily bend to the skirts of the grove, andstill did he return sad, without any immediate cause of sorrow, anddisappointed, without any previous expectation. To contemplate thefrailty, to witness the errors of the species to which we belong, is tomortify that self-love, which is inherent in our natures; yet to bedissatisfied with others, is to be convinced of our own superiority. Itis to triumph, while we condemn--it is to pity, while we sympathize.But, when we become dissatisfied with ourselves; when a proudconsciousness of former strength unites itself with a sense of existingweakness; when the heart has no feeling to turn to for solace; when themind has no principle to resort to for support; when suffering isunalleviated by self-esteem, and no feeling of internal approbationsoothes the irritation of the discontented spirit; then all is hopeless,cold, and gloomy, and misery becomes aggravated by the necessity whichour pride dictates, of concealing it almost from ourselves. Dayslistlessly passed, duties neglected, energies subdued, zeal weakened;these were circumstances in the life of the apostolic Nuncio, whoseeffects he rather felt than understood. He was stunned by the revolutionwhich had taken place in his mind and feeling, by the novelty of theimages which occupied his fancy, by the association of ideas whichlinked themselves in his mind. He would not submit to the analysis ofhis feelings, and he was determined to conquer, without understandingtheir nature or tendency. Entombed and chained within the most remotedepths of his heart, he was deaf to their murmurs, and resisted theirpleadings, with all the despotism of a great and lofty mind, createdequally to command others and itself. With the dawn, therefore, of themorning, he issued from his cave, intending to proceed to Sirinagur,determined no longer to confine his views to the conversion of thesolitary infidel; but to change, at once, the scene and object, whichhad lately engrossed all the powers of his being, and to bestow upon amultitude, those sacred exertions, which he had, of late, whollyconfined to an individual.

  His route to Sirinagur lay near the dwelling of the Priestess. Heperceived, at a considerable distance, the train of the Guru returningto his college; Luxima, therefore, was again mistress of her owndelicious solitude. The impulse of the man was to return to the grotto,but the decision of the Priest was to proceed, to effect his originalintention. As he advanced, the glittering shafts of Luxima’s verandahsmet his eye, and he abruptly found himself under the cannella-alba tree,beneath whose shade he had last beheld her. He paused, as he believed,to contemplate its luxuriancy and its beauty, which had before escapedhis observation. He admired its majestic height, crowned by branches,which drooped with their own abundance, and hung in fantastic wreaths ofgreen and brilliant foliage, mingling with their verdure, blossoms ofpurple and scarlet, and berries bright and richly clustered. But anadmiration so coldly directed, was succeeded by a feeling of amazementand delight, when he observed the date of the day of his last interviewwith Luxima carved on its bark; when he observed, hanging near it, awreath of the may-hya, whose snowy blossoms breathe no fragrance, and towhich an oly-leaf was attached, bearing the following inscription fromthe Persian of Saddi: “The rose withers, when she no longer hears thesong of the nightingale.”

  The lovely elegance of mind, which thus so delicately conveyed itssecret feeling, received a tribute, which the votarist trembled as hepresented; and pure and holy lips, which had hitherto only pressed thesaintly shrine, or consecrated relic, now sealed a kiss, no longer cold,upon an object devotion had not sanctified. But the chill hand ofreligion checked the human feeling as it rose; and the blood ran coldlyback to the heart, from which, a moment before, it had been impelled,with a force and violence he shuddered to recollect.

  Suddenly assuming a look of severity, as if even to awe, or to deceivehimself, he hurried on, nor once turned his eye towards the sunnyheights which Luxima’s pavilion crowned. He now proceeded through therocky defile, which formed the mouth of the valley, and advanced into anavenue, which extended for a league, and led to various towns, anddifferent pagodas. This avenue, grand and extensive as it was, was yetcomposed of a single tree; but it was the banyan-tree, the mightymonarch of Eastern forests; at once the most stupendous and mostbeautiful production of the vegetable world. The symbol of eternity,from its perpetual verdure and perpetual spring, independent ofrevolving seasons, and defying the decay of time, it stands alone andbold, reproducing its own existence, and multiplying its own form, freshand unfaded amidst the endless generation it propagates; while everybranch, as emulous of the parent greatness, throws out its fibrousroots, and, fastening in the earth, becomes independent, without beingdisunited from the ancient and original stem. Thus, in variousdirections, proceeds the living arcade, whose great and splendid orderthe Architect of the universe himself designed; while above the leafycanopy descend festoons of sprays and fibres, which, progressivelymaturing, branch off in lighter arches, extending the growing fabricfrom season to season, and supplying, at once, shade, fruit, and odour,sometimes to mighty legions, encamped beneath its arms; sometimes topilgrim troops, who make its shade the temple of their worship, andcelebrate, beneath its gigantic foliage, their holy festivals and mysticrites. This tree, which belongs alone to those mighty regions, where Godcreated man, and man beheld his Creator, excited a powerful emotion inthe bosom of the Missionary as he gazed on it.

  It was through the arcades of the wondrous banyan, that a scene finelyappropriate struck his view--an Eastern armament in motion, descendingthe brow of one of the majestic mountains of Sirinagur: the arms of thetroops glittering to the sun-beam, flashed like lightning through thedark shade of the intervening woods, while, in their approach, were morevisibly seen, elephants surmounted with towers; camels, bearing on theirarched necks the gaudy trappings of war; the crescent of Mahomet beamingon the standard of the Mogul legions; and bright spears, and featheryarrows, distinguishing the corps of Hindu native troops; the vanbreaking from the line to guard the passes, and detachments hangingback in the rear to protect the equipage; while the main body, as if byan electric impulse, halted, as it gradually reached the valley where itwas to encamp. This spectacle, so grand, so new, and so imposing, struckon the governing faculty of the Missionary’s character--his stro
ng andpowerful imagination. He approached with rapid steps the spot where thetroops had halted; he observed the commander-in-chief descend from aTartar horse; he was distinguished by the imperial turban of the Mogulprinces, but still more by the youthful majesty of his look, and by thevelocity of his movements. Darting from rank to rank, he appeared like aflashing beam of light, while his deep voice, as it pronounced the wordof command, was re-echoed from hill to hill with endless vibration.Already a camp arose, as if by magic, among the luxuriant shrubs of theglen. The white flags of the royal pavilion waved over a cascade ofliving water, and tents of snowy whiteness, in various lines,intersected each other amidst the rich shades of the mango andcocoa-tree; the thirsty elephants, divested of their ponderous loads,steeped their trunks in the fountains; and the weary camel reposed hislimbs on banks of odorous grasses. All now breathed shade, refreshment,and repose, after heat, fatigue, and action. Faquirs, and pilgrims, andjugglers, and dancers, were seen mingling among the disarmed troops; andthe roll of drums, the tinkling of bells, the hum of men, and noise ofcattle, with the deep tone of the Tublea, and the shrill blast of thewar-horn, bestowed appropriate sounds upon the magic scene. As theMissionary gazed on the animated spectacle, a straggler from the campapproached to gather fruit from the tree under which he stood, and theMissionary inquired if the troops he beheld were those of Aurengzebe?“No,” replied the soldier; “we do not fight under the banners of anusurper, and a fratricide; we are the troops of his eldest brother, andrightful sovereign, Daara, whom we are going to join at Lahore, led onby his gallant son, the ‘lion of war,’ Solyman Sheko. Harassed byfatigue, and worn out by want and heat, after crossing the wild andsavage mountains of Sirinagur, Solyman has obtained the protection ofthe Rajah of Cashmire, who permits him to encamp his troops in yonderglen, until he receives intelligence from the Emperor, his father, whosefate is at present doubtful[1].”

  The soldier, having then filled his turban with fruit, returned to hiscamp.

  He who truly loves, will still seek, or find, a reference, in everyobject, to the state and nature of his own feelings; and that the fateof a mighty empire should be connected with the secret emotions of asolitary heart, and that “the pomp and circumstance of war” shouldassociate itself with the hopes and fears, with the happiness and miseryof a religious recluse living in remote wilds, devoted to the service ofHeaven, and lost to all the passions of the world, was an event at onceincredible--and true!

  A new sense of suffering, a new feeling of anxiety, had seized theMissionary, when he understood the gallant son of Daara, the idol of theempire, had come to fix himself in the vicinage of the consecratedgroves of the Cashmirian Priestess. He knew that, in India, the personof a woman was deemed so sacred, that, even in all the tumult ofwarfare, the sex was equally respected by the conqueror and theconquered; but he also knew in what extraordinary estimation the beautyof the Cashmirian women was held by the Mogul princes; and though Luximawas guarded equally by her sacred character and holy vows, yet Solymanwas a hero and a prince! and the fame of her charms might meet his ear,and the lonely solitude of her residence lure his steps. This idea grewso powerfully on his imagination, that he already believed some rudestraggler from the camp might have violated, by his presence, theconsecrated groves of her devotion, and, unable to dismiss the thought,he hurried back, forgetful of his intention to visit Sirinagur, andbelieving that his presence only could afford safeguard and protectionto her, who, but a short time back, shrunk in horror from his approach.So slow and thoughtful had been his movements, and so long had hesuffered himself to be attracted by a spectacle so novel as the one hehad lately contemplated, that, notwithstanding the rapidity of hisreturn, it was evening when he reached the sacred grove; he advancedwithin view of the verandah, he darted like lightning through everyalley or deep-entangled glen; but no unhallowed footstep disturbed thesilence, which was only animated by the sweet, wild chirp of the mayana;no human form, save his own, peopled the lovely solitude; all breathedof peace, and of repose. In the clear blue vault of heaven the moon hadrisen with a bright and radiant lustre, known only in those pureregions, where clouds are deemed phenomena. The Missionary paused for amoment to gaze on Luxima’s verandah, and thought that, haply, even then,with that strange mixture of natural faith and idolatrous superstition,which distinguished the character of her devotion, she was worshipping,at the shrine of Camdeo, in the almost inspired language of religioussublimity. This thought disturbed him much; and he asked himself whatsacrifice he would not make, to behold that pure but wandering soul,imbued with the spirit of Christian truth; but what sacrifice on earthwas reserved for him to make, who had no earthly enjoyment torelinquish? “Yes,” he exclaimed, “there is yet one: to relinquish, forever, all communion with Luxima!” As this thought escaped his mind, heshuddered: had she then become so necessary to his existence, that torelinquish her society, would be deemed a sacrifice? He dismissed theterrific idea, and hurried from a place where all breathed of her, whomhe endeavoured to banish from his recollection. As he approached hiscave, he was struck by the singular spectacle it exhibited: a fracturein the central part of the roof admitted the light of the moon, whichrose immediately above it; and its cloudless rays, concentrated as to afocus, within the narrow limits of the grotto, shone with a dazzlinglustre, which was increased and reflected by the pendent spars, andsurrounding congelations; while a fine relief was afforded by the moreremote cavities of the grotto, and the deep shadow of the œcynum,whose dusky flowers and mourning leaves drooped round its entrance. Butit was on the altar, from its peculiar position, that the beams fellwith brightest lustre; and the Missionary, as he approached, thoughtthat he beheld on its rude steps, a vision brighter than his holiesttrance had e’er been blessed with; for nothing human ever looked sofair, so motionless, or so seraphic. His eye was dazzled; hisimagination was bewildered; he invoked his patron saint, and crossedhimself; he approached, and gazed, and yet he doubted; but it was nospirit of an higher sphere; no bright creation of religious ecstacy:--itwas Luxima! it was the pagan! seated on the steps of the Christianaltar; her brow shaded by her veil; her hands clasped upon the Biblewhich lay open on her knee, and a faint glory playing round her head,reflected from the golden crucifix suspended above it. She slept; butyet so young was her repose, so much it seemed the stealing dawn ofdoubtful slumber, that her humid eyes still glistened beneath the deepshadow of her scarce-closed lashes: the hue of light which fell upon herfeatures, was blue and faint; and the air diffused around her figure,harmonized with the soft and solemn character of the moonlight cave. TheMonk stood gazing, every sense bound up in one; his soul was in hisglance, and his look was such as beams in the eye when it snatches itslast look from the object dearest to the doting heart, till aninvoluntary sigh, as it burst from his lips, chased by its echo, thesoft and stealing sleep of Luxima. She started, and looked round her, asif almost doubtful of her identity. She beheld the Missionary standingnear her, and arose in confusion, yet with a confusion tinctured bypleasurable surprise.

  “Luxima!” he exclaimed, in a voice full of softness, and for the firsttime addressing her by her name. “Father!” she timidly returned,casting down her eyes; then, after a short but touching pause, sheadded, “Thou wonderest much to see me here, at such an hour as this!”

  “Much,” he returned: “but, dearest daughter, seeing thee as I have seenthee, I rejoice much more.”

  “Many days,” she said, in a low voice, “many days have fled since Ibeheld thee; and I prophesied, from the vision of my last night’s dream,that thy wound would gangrene, were it not speedily touched by the threesacrificial threads of a Brahmin; therefore came I hither to seek thee,and brought with me thy Christian Shaster, but I found thee not:thinking thou wast performing poojah, near some sacred tank, I sat medown upon thy altar steps, to wait thy coming, and to read thy Shaster;till weariness, the darkness, and the silence of the place, stole uponmy senses, the doubtful slumber in which thou didst find me wrapt.”

  “And dost thou regret,
” said the Missionary, with a pensive smile, “thatthe spirit of thy prophecy is false? Or dost thou rejoice, that mywound, which awakened thy anxiety, is healed?” Luxima made no reply--thefeeling of the woman, and the pride of the Prophetess, seemed tostruggle in her bosom; yet a smile from lips, which on _her_ had neversmiled before, seemed to excite some emotion in her countenance. Andafter a short pause, she arose, and presenting him the Scriptures, said,“Christian, take back thy Shaster, for it should belong to thee alone.’Tis a wondrous book! and full of holy love; worthy to be ranked withthe sacred _Veidam_, which the great Spirit presented to Brahma topromote the happiness and wisdom of his creatures.” The Missionary hadnot yet recovered from the confusion into which the unexpectedappearance of Luxima, in his grotto, had thrown him; he was, therefore,but ill prepared to address her on a subject so awfully interesting, asthat to which her simple, but sacrilegious commentary, led. He stood,for a moment, confounded; but, observing that Luxima was about todepart, he said, “Thou camest hither to seek and to do me a kindness,and yet my presence banishes thee: at least, suffer me to give thee myprotection on thy return.” As he spoke, they left the grotto together;and, after a long silence, during which, both seemed engaged with theirown thoughts, the Missionary said, “Thou hast observed truly, that theinspired work I have put into thy hands is full of holy love; for theChristian doctrine is the doctrine of the heart, and, true to all itspurest feelings, is full of that tender-loving mercy, which blends andunites the various selfish interests of mankind, in one great sentimentof brotherly affection and religious love!”

  “Such,” said Luxima, with enthusiasm, “is that doctrine of mystic love,by which our true religion unites its followers to each other, and tothe Source of all good; for we cannot cling to the hope of infinitefelicity, without rejoicing in the first daughter of love to God, whichis charity towards man. Even here,” she continued, raising her eyes intransport, “in a dark forlorn state of separation from our beloved, welive solely in him, in contemplating the moment when we shall bereunited to him in endless beatitude!”

  “Luxima! Luxima!” exclaimed the Missionary, with emotion, “thisrhapsody, glowing and tender as it is, is not the language of religion,but the eloquence of an ardent enthusiasm; it bears not the pure andsacred stamp of holy truth, but the gloss and colouring of humanfeeling. O my daughter! true religion, pure and simple as it is, is yetawful and sublime--to be approached with fear and trembling, and to becultivated, not in fanciful and tender intimacy, but in spirit and intruth; by sacrifices of the earthly passions, and the human feeling; bytears which sue for mercy, and by sufferings which obtain it.” As hespoke, his voice rose; his agitation increased. Luxima looked timidly inhis eyes, and sighed profoundly: the severity of his manner awed hergentle nature; the rigid doctrines he preached, subdued her enthusiasm.She was silent: and the Monk, touched by her softness and trembling,lest, in scaring her imagination or wounding her feelings, he mightcounteract the effects he had already, and with such difficulty,produced; or, by personally estranging her from himself, loosen thosefragile ties which were slowly drawing her to Heaven; he addressed herin a softened and a tender voice: “Luxima, forgive me! if to thy gentlenature, the manners of a man, unused to any intercourse with thy sex,and wholly devoted to the cause for which he sacrifices every selfishfeeling; if, my daughter, I say, they appear cold, rigid, and severe;judge not of the _motive_, by the _manner_; nor think that aught, butthe most powerful interest in thy temporal and eternal welfare, couldmove him to a zeal so ardent, as he has now betrayed. Forgive him,then, who, to recall thy wandering mind to truth, would risk a thousandlives. Forgive him, whose thoughts, and hopes, and views, are now, all,all engrossed by thee; who makes no prayer to Heaven, which calls notblessing on thy head; whose life is scarcely more than one long thoughtof Luxima!” The Missionary stopt, abruptly: never had his zeal forconversion led him before to such excess of enthusiasm, as that he nowbetrayed; while Luxima, touched and animated by a display of tender andardent feeling, so sympathetic to her own, exclaimed, with softness andwith energy, “O father, thus I also feel towards thee; and yet, to seethee prostrate at the shrine of Brahma, _I_ would not see thee changedfrom what thou art--for thou belongest to thy sublime and pure religion;and thy religion to thee, who art thyself so noble and so true, that,much as I do stand in awe of thee, yet more do I delight to hear, and tobehold thee, than any earthly good beside!”

  The Missionary pressed his hand to his forehead as she spoke, and drewhis cowl over his face. He returned no answer, to a speech, every wordof which had reached his inmost heart. Thoughts of a various naturecrossed each other in his mind; and those he endeavoured to suppress,were still more dominant than those he sought to encourage. At last aglimmering light fell from the summit of the mound which was crowned byLuxima’s pavilion; and denoted that the moment of separation was near.To conceal from Luxima, that Solyman and his army were encamped in herneighbourhood--and yet to warn her of the danger of wandering alone inthe consecrated shades of her dwelling; were points, in his opinion,necessary, but difficult, to reconcile. He, therefore, slightlyobserved, that, as the scattered troops of Daara were proceeding throughCashmire to Lahore, he would, in future, become the guardian of herwanderings, and hover round her path, at sunset, until the absence ofthe intruders should banish all apprehension of intrusion. Luximareplied to him only by a sigh half suppressed, and by a look, timid,tender, and doubtful; in which a lingering prejudice, mingled with agrowing confidence, and feeling, and opinion, fading into each other,still seemed faintly opposed. She half-extended to him a hand whichinstinctively recoiled from the touch of his; and when he _almost_pressed it, trembled, and hastily withdrew.

  Hilarion, as he wandered back, alone, to his grotto, recalled his lastconversation with Luxima; and gave himself up to a train of reflection,new as the feelings by which it was inspired. Hitherto he had consideredpleasure and sin as inseparably connected, since, to suffer and toresist, was the natural destiny of man: but the Indian Priestess, sopure, though mistaken in her piety; so innocent, and yet so pleasurablein her life; so wholly devoted to Heaven, yet so enjoying upon earth,convinced him that his doctrine was too exclusive; and that there were,in this world, sources of blameless pleasure, which it were, perhaps,more culpable to neglect than to embrace.

  “It is impious,” he said, “to suppose that God created man to tastebitterness only; it is also folly; since, formed as we are, theexistence of evil presupposes that of good: for the suffering we endureis but the loss of happiness we have enjoyed, or the privation of thatwe sigh for: and, though the pride of human virtue may resist theconviction, yet the energy of intellect, the fortitude of virtue, orthe zeal of faith, can have no value in our eyes, but as they lead tothe happiness of others, or to our own. The object, even of religionitself, points out to us, a good to be attained, and an evil to beavoided; it prescribes to us as the end of our actions, eternalfelicity; nor can a rational being be supposed to act voluntarily, butwith a view to his own immediate or distant happiness. That good canindeed alone be termed happiness, which is the most lasting, the mostpure; and is not that ‘the good which faith preferred?’” At thisconclusion he sighed profoundly, and added, “Providence has indeed alsoplaced within our reach, many lesser intermediate enjoyments, andendowed us with strong and almost indestructible propensities to obtainthem; but are they intended as objects of our pursuit and acquirement,or as tests by which our imperfect and frail natures are to be tried,purified, and strengthened? Alas! it is instinct to desire; it is reasonto _resist_! The struggle is sometimes too much for the imperfection ofhumanity. Man, to be greatly good, must be supremely miserable; man, tosecure his future happiness, must sustain his existing evil; and, toenjoy the felicity of the world to come, he must trample beneath hisfeet the pleasures of that which is.” It was thus that his new mode offeeling was still opposed by his ancient habit of thinking; and that amind, struggling between a natural bias and a religious principle ofresistance, between a passionate sentimen
t and an habitualself-command, became a scene of conflict and agitation. His restlessdays passed slowly away, in endless cogitations, equally unproductive ofany influence upon his feelings or his life. But when evening came, inall the mildness of her softened glories, peace and joy came with her;for then the form of his Neophyte rose upon his view: her smile oflanguid pleasure met his eye, her accent of tender softness sighed uponhis ear: sometimes moving beside him, sometimes seated at his feet--hespoke, and she listened--he looked on her, and she believed: while hetrembled from a twofold cause--to observe, that her mind seemed moreengaged with the object who spoke, than with the subject discussed; andthat she too frequently appeared to attend to the doctrine, for the sakeof him only who preached it. But if in one hour her pure soul expandedto the reception of truth; in the next, it gave up its faculties to asuperstition the most idolatrous: if now she pressed to her vestal lipsthe consecrated beads of the Christian rosary--again she knelt at theshrine of her tutelar idol: when her spiritual guide, affecting aseverity foreign to his feelings, reproved the inconsistency of herprinciples, exposed the folly and incongruity of a faith so vacillating,and urged her openly to embrace, and publicly to profess the Christiandoctrine, she fell at his feet--she trembled--she wept. The feelings ofthe woman, and the prejudices of the idolatress, equally at variance inher tender and erring mind; fearing equally to banish from her sight thepreacher, or to embrace the tenets he proposed to her belief; she said,“It were better to die, than to live under the curse of my nation; itwere better to suffer the tortures of Narekah[2], than on earth to _losecast_, and become a wretched Chancalas!” As she pronounced these words,so dreadful to an Indian ear, her whole frame became convulsed andagitated. And the Missionary, endeavouring to sooth the emotions he hadexcited, sought only to recall that mild and melting loveliness of lookand air, his admonitions had chased away, or his severity discomposed;while, frequently, to vary the tone of their intercourse, and to give ita home-felt attraction in the eyes of his Neophyte, he led her to speakof the domestic circumstances of her life, of the poetical mysteries ofher religion, and the singular usages and manners of her nation. It wasin such moments as these, that the native genius of her ardent characterbetrayed itself; and that she poured on his listening ear, that tenderstrain of feeling, or impassioned eloquence, which, brightened with allthe sublimity of Eastern style, was characterized by all that fluentsoftness, and spirited delicacy, which belongs to woman, in whateverregion she exists, when animated by the desire of pleasing _him_, theobject of her preference. “And while looks intervened, or smiles,” thepleasure which these interesting conversations conferred on a mind sonew to such enjoyments, was secretly and unconsciously cherished by theMissionary, and obviously betrayed, by the soft tranquillity andincreasing languor of his manner; by the long and ardent gaze of hisfixed eyes; by the low-drawn sigh, which so often lingered on the top ofhis breath; and by all those traits of pleasurable sensation, whichspoke a man, in whose strong mind, rigid principles, and tranquil heart,human feeling, even under the pure and sacred veil of religion, wasmaking an unconscious and insidious inroad. Confirmed by the opinion ofothers, and by his own experience, into a belief of his infallibility,he dared not even to _suspect_ himself: yet there were moments when alook of ineffable tenderness, a ringlet wafted by the wind over hischeek, or eyes drawn in sudden confusion from his face, awakened himfrom his illusionary dream--and then he flew to prayers and penance, forthe indulgence of feelings, which had not yet stained his spotless life,by any thought or deed of evil; and, though the sudden consciousnesssometimes struck him, that temptation only was the test of virtue, andthat nature could not be said to be subdued, till she had beentried--yet he seldom suffered himself to analyze feelings, which perhapswould have ceased to exist, had they been perfectly understood. It wasthus, the innate purity of the mind betrayed the unconscious sensibilityof the heart, while the passions became so intimately incorporated withthe spirit, as to leave their influence and agency almost equal.Frequently seeking, in the sophistry of the heart, an excuse for itsweakness, he said, “It is Heaven which has implanted in our nature theseeds of all affection, and the love we bear to an individual is but amodification of that sentiment we are commanded to cherish for thespecies; and surely that love must be pure, which we cherish, withoutthe wish or hope of gathering any fruit from its existence, but that ofthe pleasure of loving: the disinterestedness of a Christian may go thusfar, but can go no further; the purest of all canonized spirits[3] hassaid, ‘The wicked are miserable, because they are incapable of loving.’Love, therefore, is solely referable to virtue; it is by the corruptionof passion that it ceases to be love. May we then continue to love, thatwe may continue to be guiltless!”