existence weighted by a sense of unreality, of
blank, of horrid negation. This was the nightmare
which visited Bulwer Lytton's neophyte
in "Zanoni"; and even Zanoni himself, who
had learned great truths, and been entrusted
with great powers, had not actually passed the
threshold where fear and hope, despair and
joy seem at one moment absolute realities, at
the next mere forms of fancy.

This initial trial is often brought on us by
life itself. For life is after all, the great
teacher. We return to study it, after we have
acquired power over it, just as the master in
chemistry learns more in the laboratory than
his pupil does. There are persons so near the
door of knowledge that life itself prepares
them for it, and no individual hand has to
invoke the hideous guardian of the entrance.
These must naturally be keen and powerful
organizations, capable of the most vivid pleasure;
then pain comes and fills its great duty.
The most intense forms of suffering fall on
such a nature, till at last it arouses from its
stupor of consciousness, and by the force of its
internal vitality steps over the threshold into a
place of peace. Then the vibration of life loses
its power of tyranny. The sensitive nature
must suffer still; but the soul has freed itself
and stands aloof, guiding the life towards its