But ah! so clearly is the vision seen,
The dead seem raised, or Death has never been,
Were I not here alone.

This is great art in its power of picturing a memory of the heart. Let us
notice some of the beauties. The lover is pale because he is afraid,
anxious; he is going to ask a question and he does not know how she may
answer him. All this was long ago, years and years ago, but the strong
emotions of that morning leave their every detail painted in remembrance,
with strange vividness After all those years the man still recollects the
appearance of the room, the sunshine entering and the crimson rose looking
into the room from the garden, with bees humming round it. Then after the
question had been asked and happily answered, neither could speak for joy;
and because of the silence all the sounds of nature outside became almost
painfully distinct. Now he remembers how he heard in that room the sound
of the wind in far-away trees, the singing of a bird--he also remembers
all the colours and the lights of the day. But it was very, very long ago,
and she is dead. Still, the memory is so clear and bright in his heart
that it is as if time had stood still, or as if she had come back from the
grave. Only one thing assures him that it is but a memory--he is alone.

Returning now to the subject of love's illusion in itself, let me remind
you that the illusion does not always pass away--not at all. It passes
away in every case of happy union, when it has become no longer necessary
to the great purposes of nature. But in case of disappointment, loss,
failure to win the maiden desired, it often happens that the ideal image
never fades away, but persistently haunts the mind through life, and is
capable thus of making even the most successful life unhappy. Sometimes
the result of such disappointment may be to change all a man's ideas about
the world, about life, about religion; and everything remains darkened for