the immensity of the prospect which it illustrated, I was surprised
that among so many men of genius who had directed their inquiries
towards the same science, that I alone should be reserved to discover
so astonishing a secret.

Remember, I am not recording the vision of a madman. The sun does not
more certainly shine in the heavens than that which I now affirm is
true. Some miracle might have produced it, yet the stages of the
discovery were distinct and probable. After days and nights of
incredible labour and fatigue, I succeeded in discovering the cause of
generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing
animation upon lifeless matter.

The astonishment which I had at first experienced on this discovery
soon gave place to delight and rapture. After so much time spent in
painful labour, to arrive at once at the summit of my desires was the
most gratifying consummation of my toils. But this discovery was so
great and overwhelming that all the steps by which I had been
progressively led to it were obliterated, and I beheld only the
result. What had been the study and desire of the wisest men since the
creation of the world was now within my grasp. Not that, like a magic
scene, it all opened upon me at once: the information I had obtained
was of a nature rather to direct my endeavours so soon as I should
point them towards the object of my search than to exhibit that object
already accomplished. I was like the Arabian who had been buried with
the dead and found a passage to life, aided only by one glimmering and
seemingly ineffectual light.

I see by your eagerness and the wonder and hope which your eyes
express, my friend, that you expect to be informed of the secret with