call mine! only ONE being press as kindred to my heart! And I
shudder at the thought of meeting with this being--I should bless
the thought that she was dead! Father! thou didst ruin one being
and make three miserable. I have never loved thee; bitterness
germinated within my breast when I became acquainted with thee!
Mother! thy features have died out of my recollection; I revere
thee! Thou wast all love; to love didst thou offer up thy life--
more than life! Pray for me with thy God! Pray for me, ye dead! if
there is immortality; if the flesh is not alone born again in grass
and the worm; if the soul is not lost in floods of air! We shall be
unconscious of it: eternally shall we sleep! eternally!" Otto
supported his forehead upon the window-frame, his arm sank
languidly, "Mother! poor mother! thou didst gain by death, even if
it be merely an eternal sleep,--asleep without dreams! We have only
a short time to live, and yet we divide our days of life with
sleep! My body yearns after this short death! I will sleep--sleep
like all my beloved ones! They do not awaken!" He threw himself
upon the bed. The cold air from the sea blew through the open
window. The wearied body conquered; he sank into the death-like
sleep, whilst his doubting soul, ever active, presented him with
living dreams.



CHAPTER XIV

"Man seems to me a foolish being; he drives along over the waves of
time, endlessly thrown up and down, and descrying a little verdant
spot, formed of mud and stagnant moor and of putrid green
mouldiness, he cries out, Land! He rows thither, ascends--and sinks