lose much of its bitterness. But there are difficulties in the way which
only time, and the energy of a soul that centers all its faculties in
one desire, one enterprise, can overcome. And the chief difficulty I
find is in yourself--in that strange, untoward disposition so often
revealed in your conversation, which you have shown even now; for to be
thus questioned and pressed, and to have my judgment doubted, would have
greatly offended me in another. Remember this, and do not abuse the
privilege you enjoy: remember that you must greatly change before I can
share with you the secrets of my heart that concern you. And bear in
mind, my son, that I am not rebuking you for a want of knowledge; for I
know that for many deficiencies you are not blameworthy. I know, for
instance, that nature has denied to you that melodious and flexible
voice in which it is our custom every day to render homage to the
Father, to express all the sacred feelings of our hearts, all our love
for each other, the joy we have in life, and even our griefs and
sorrows. For grief is like a dark, oppressive cloud, until from lip and
hand it breaks in the rain of melody, and we are lightened, so that even
the things that are painful give to life a new and chastened glory. And
as with music, so with all other arts. There is a twofold pleasure in
contemplating our Father's works: in the first and lower kind you share
with us; but the second and more noble, springing from the first, is
ours through that faculty by means of which the beauty and harmony of
the visible world become transmuted in the soul, which is like a pencil
of glass receiving the white sunbeam into itself, and changing it to
red, green, and violet-colored light: thus nature transmutes itself in
our minds, and is expressed in art. But in you this second faculty is
wanting, else you would not willingly forego so great a pleasure as its
exercise affords, and love nature like one that loves his fellow-man,
but has no words to express so sweet a feeling. For the happiness of
love with sympathy, when made known and returned, is increased an