friends, who were lounging upon a sofa placed in a sort of alcove, at the
farther end, when the same fine nervous thrill, of which I have spoken,
suddenly shot through me. But this time it was accompanied with a burning
sensation at the pit of the stomach; and, instead of growing upon me with
the gradual pace of healthy slumber, and resolving me, as before, into
air, it came with the intensity of a pang, and shot throbbing along the
nerves to the extremities of my body. The sense of limitation---of the
confinement of our senses within the bounds of our own flesh and
blood--instantly fell away. The walls of my frame were burst outward and
tumbled into ruin; and, without thinking what form I wore--losing sight
even of all idea of form--I felt that I existed throughout a vast extent
of space. The blood, pulsed from my heart, sped through uncounted leagues
before it reached my extremities; the air drawn into my lungs expanded
into seas of limpid ether, and the arch of my skull was broader than the
vault of heaven. Within the concave that held my brain, were the
fathomless deeps of blue; clouds floated there, and the winds of heaven
rolled them together, and there shone the orb of the sun. It was--though I
thought not of that at the time--like a revelation of the mystery of
omnipresence. It is difficult to describe this sensation, or the rapidity
with which it mastered me. In the state of mental exaltation in which I
was then plunged, all sensations, as they rose, suggested more or less
coherent images. They presented themselves to me in a double form: one
physical, and therefore to a certain extent tangible; the other spiritual,
and revealing itself in a succession of splendid metaphors. The physical
feeling of extended being was accompanied by the image of an exploding
meteor, not subsiding into darkness, but continuing to shoot from its
centre or nucleus--which corresponded to the burning spot at the pit of my
stomach--incessant adumbrations of light that finally lost themselves in
the infinity of space. To my mind, even now, this image is still the best
illustration of my sensations, as I recall them; but I greatly doubt