Thanking Him, Therefore, And Considering How
Charming Was The Loose Habit Of Small Uncentralized Societies, I Went
Merrily On To The Bridge, Meaning To Walk Across It By Stepping From
Sleeper To Sleeper.
But it was not to be so simple.
The powers of the
air, that hate to have their kingdom disturbed, watched me as I began.
I had not been engaged upon it a dozen yards when I was seized with
terror.
I have much to say further on in this book concerning terror: the
panic that haunts high places and the spell of many angry men. This
horrible affection of the mind is the delight of our modern
scribblers; it is half the plot of their insane 'short stories', and
is at the root of their worship of what they call 'strength', a
cowardly craving for protection, or the much more despicable
fascination of brutality. For my part I have always disregarded it as
something impure and devilish, unworthy of a Christian. Fear I think,
indeed, to be in the nature of things, and it is as much part of my
experience to be afraid of the sea or of an untried horse as it is to
eat and sleep; but terror, which is a sudden madness and paralysis of
the soul, that I say is from hell, and not to be played with or
considered or put in pictures or described in stories. All this I say
to preface what happened, and especially to point out how terror is in
the nature of a possession and is unreasonable.
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