THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIE. 



221 



vanced towards the place where they all were growing. Its char- 

 acter became more and more transcendent as I approached, and the 

 one large flower of which it consisted was lifted up considerably 

 above the rest. I then saw that it was Light, a prismatic globe, 

 quite steady, and burning with a purity and sweetness, and almost 

 an affectionate spirit of beauty, as if it were alive. I never thought 

 of touching it, although still I thought it a flower that was grow- 

 ing ; and I heard a kind of sound, faint and dim, as the echo of 

 musical glasses, that seemed to proceed from the flower of light, 

 and pervade the whole bank with low, spiritual music. On trying 

 to remember its appearance and essential beauty more distinctly, I 

 am unable even to reconceive to myself what it was, whether alto- 

 gether different from the other flowers, or of some perfectly glo- 

 rious representation of them all ; not the queen of flowers, but the 

 star of flowers, or flower-star. Now, as I did not, I presume, see 

 this shining, silent, prismatic, vegetable creature, I myself created 

 it, and it was ' the same, but, ah, how different' of the imagination, 

 mingling light with leaf, stones with roses, decaying with undecay- 

 ing, heaven with earth, and eternity with time. Yet the product, 

 nothing startling, or like a phenomenon that urged to inquiry, 

 What is this ? but beheld in perfect acquiescence in its existence 

 as a thing intensely and delightfully beautiful ; but in whose per- 

 ception and emotion, of whose earthly and heavenly beauty, my 

 beholding spirit was satisfied, oh ! far more than satisfied, so purer 

 than dew or light of this earth ; yet as certainly and permanently 

 existing as myself existed, or the common flowers, themselves most 

 fair, that lay, a usual spring assemblage in a garden where human 

 hands worked, and mortal beings walked, among the umbrage of 

 perishable trees ! Perhaps we see and feel thus in heaven, and even 

 the Alexander Blair whom I loved well on earth, may be thus pro- 

 portionally loved by me in another life. Yours forever, 



"J. W." 



Anions: other friends to whom he resorted for advice at this time, 

 was his well-beloved teacher, Professor Jardine. The judicious 

 " Hints" of the old man are given with characteristic method and 

 kindliness, but scarcely call for publication here. So far as the 

 order of the course was concerned, my father preferred to follow 

 his own plan, as sketched in his first letter to Blair. To that plan, 



