dead: they have ceased from their labors and are at rest.

But for the living, when death has entered and removed the best friend,
Fate has done her worst; the plummet has sounded the depths of grief, and
thereafter nothing can inspire terror. At one fell stroke all petty
annoyances and corroding cares are sunk into nothingness. The memory of a
great love lives enshrined in undying amber. It affords a ballast 'gainst
all the storms that blow, and although it lends an unutterable sadness, it
imparts an unspeakable peace. Where there is this haunting memory of a
great love lost, there are always forgiveness, charity and a sympathy that
makes the man brother to all who suffer and endure. The individual himself
is nothing: he has nothing to hope for, nothing to lose, nothing to win,
and this constant memory of the high and exalted friendship that once was
his is a nourishing source of strength; it constantly purifies the mind
and inspires the heart to nobler living and diviner thinking. The man is
in communication with Elemental Conditions.

To know an ideal friendship and to have it fade from your grasp and flee
as a shadow before it is touched with the sordid breath of selfishness, or
sullied by misunderstandings, is the highest good. And the constant
dwelling in sweet, sad recollection on the exalted virtues of the one that
has gone, tends to crystallize these very virtues in the heart of him who
meditates them. The beauty with which love adorns its object becomes at
last the possession of the one who loves.

At the hour when the strong and helpful, yet tender and sympathetic,
friendship of Alfred Tennyson and Arthur Hallam was at its height, there
came a brief and abrupt word from Vienna to the effect that Arthur was
dead.