The last psalm was uttered neither by word, look, nor gesture, nor by
any of those signs which men employ to communicate their thoughts, but
as the soul speaks to itself; for at the moment when Seraphita
revealed herself in her true nature, her thoughts were no longer
enslaved by human words. The violence of that last prayer had burst
her bonds. Her soul, like a white dove, remained for an instant poised
above the body whose exhausted substances were about to be
annihilated.

The aspiration of the Soul toward heaven was so contagious that
Wilfrid and Minna, beholding those radiant scintillations of Life,
perceived not Death.

They had fallen on their knees when _he_ had turned toward his Orient,
and they shared his ecstasy.

The fear of the Lord, which creates man a second time, purging away
his dross, mastered their hearts.

Their eyes, veiled to the things of Earth, were opened to the
Brightness of Heaven.

Though, like the Seers of old called Prophets by men, they were filled
with the terror of the Most High, yet like them they continued firm
when they found themselves within the radiance where the Glory of the
_Spirit_ shone.

The veil of flesh, which, until now, had hidden that glory from their
eyes, dissolved imperceptibly away, and left them free to behold the