But an unwavering and commanding virtue would compel even
its most fantastic and faintest dreams to respect its
ever-wakeful authority; as we are accustomed to say carelessly,
we should never have _dreamed_ of such a thing. Our truest life
is when we are in dreams awake.
"And, more to lulle him in his slumber soft,
A trickling streame from high rock tumbling downe,
And ever-drizzling raine upon the loft,
Mixt with a murmuring winde, much like the sowne
Of swarming bees, did cast him in a swowne.
No other noyse, nor people's troublous cryes,
As still are wont t' annoy the walled towne,
Might there be heard; but careless Quiet lyes
Wrapt in eternall silence farre from enemyes."
-
THURSDAY.
"He trode the unplanted forest floor, whereon
The all-seeing sun for ages hath not shone,
Where feeds the moose, and walks the surly bear,
And up the tall mast runs the woodpecker.
. . . .
Where darkness found him he lay glad at night;
There the red morning touched him with its light.
. . . .
Go where he will, the wise man is at home,
His hearth the earth, - his hall the azure dome;
Where his clear spirit leads him, there's his road,
By God's own light illumined and foreshowed."
^Emerson^.
-
THURSDAY.
- * -
When we awoke this morning, we heard the faint, deliberate, and
ominous sound of rain-drops on our cotton roof.
