CHAP. X.] DEATH OF POMEROY. 281 



voured when alive to make themselves known to us, and 

 how the impression they had left in us remained untouched 

 and sacred during their absence. Then I thought of those 

 who had left the clearest impression on me, how some were 

 dead, and their character never known or proved to the 

 world, and their deeds never done as they would have been 

 if they had lived. But this secret knowledge is strengthen- 

 ing as well as sad, if our brother's life is an inheritance to us 

 when he falls, and we rise (like Triamond) to fight his battle 

 as well as our own. 



Do not understand all this as a theory. I wish to say 

 that it is in personal union with my friends that I hope to 

 escape the despair which belongs to the contemplation of 

 the outward aspect of things with human eyes. Either be a 

 machine and see nothing but " phenomena," or else try to 

 be a man, feeling your life interwoven, as it is, with many 

 others, and strengthened by them whether in life or in death. 

 You will say that this is what a man writes after a course of 

 healthy exercise and boisterous health, when he suddenly 

 feels a pull on his soul, but his body goes on as before. 

 But though my knowledge of our friend does not reach so 

 far back as yours, there is a great part of all my thoughts 

 which bears the mark of his honest handling, for to me he 

 was most liberal in communication, so that all manner of 

 thought became our common property. When he was ill at 

 Cambridge, my father, who was then rather better, was very 

 much concerned about him, so that afterwards, when he was 

 worse himself, he would speak of him from recollections of 

 what I had told him before. So I used to think of them 

 together, the one guiding me along by wise plans in the ways 

 of freedom, and the other supplying the energy of specula- 

 tive honesty and the freshness of a younger mind. And is 

 all gone ? Certainly not, look at it as you will. I am not 

 trying to persuade myself into hope. I find I cannot do 

 otherwise. I have been miserable about these very things 

 when there seemed no particular reason at the time, and 

 then, when the time was worst, felt well ; but that must be 

 one's own personal affair. If we can hear the General's voice 



