EVENTIDE. 99 



over these countless years. The very names they 

 bear recall the vanished races who waited for their 

 appearing and counted them friends. Now that 

 the lamps are lighted and the work of the day is 

 done is it strange that the venerable mother, whose 

 lullabies have soothed so many generations into 

 sleep, should herself appeal to us in some intimate 

 and personal way ? 



With the fading out of shore and sea and forest 

 line something deeper and more spiritual rises in 

 the soul as the mists rise on the lowlands and over 

 the surface of the waters. We surrender ourselves 

 to it silently, reverently, and a change no less sub 

 tle and penetrating is wrought in us. Our per 

 sonal ambitions, the sharply defined aims of our 

 working hours, the very limitations of our individ 

 uality, are gone ; we lose ourselves in the larger 

 life of which we are part. After the fret of the 

 day we surrender ourselves to universal life as the 

 bather, worn and spent, gives himself to the sea. 

 There is no loss of personal force, but for an hour 

 the individual activity is blended with the univer 

 sal movement and the peace and quiet of infinity 

 calm and restore the soul. Meditation comes with 

 eventide as naturally as action with the morning ; 

 our soul opens to the soul of Nature, and we dis 

 cover anew that we are one. In the noblest pas 

 sage in Latin poetry Lucretius invokes the universal 

 spirit of Nature, and identifies it with the creative 

 force which impels the stars and summons the flow- 



