Produced by Robert Cicconetti, Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions (www.canadiana.org)) ATMA. A ROMANCE BY A.C.F. (CAROLINE AUGUSTA FRAZER) "When atman (nom. sing. Atma) occurs in philosophical treatises ... it has generally been translated by soul, mind, or spirit. I tried myself to use one or other of these words, but the oftener I employed them the more I felt their inadequacy, and was driven at last to adopt ... Self as the least liable to misunderstanding." _Max Muller, in North American Review for June_, 1879. MONTREAL: JOHN LOVELL & SON, 23 ST. NICHOLAS STREET. Entered according to Act of Parliament in the year 1891, by JOHN LOVELL & SON, in the office of the Minister of Agriculture and Statistics at Ottawa. ATMA CHAPTER I. O that Decay were always beautiful! How soft the exit of the dying day, The dying season too, its disarray Is gold and scarlet, hues of gay misrule, So it in festive cheer may pass away; Fading is excellent in earth or air, With it no budding April may compare, Nor fragrant June with long love-laden hours; Sweet is decadence in the quiet bowers Where summer songs and mirth are fallen asleep, And sweet the woe when fading violets weep. O that among things dearer in their wane Our fallen faiths might numbered be, that so Religions cherished in their hour of woe Might linger round the god-deserted fane, And worshippers be loath to leave and pray That old-time power return, until there may Issue a virtue, and the faith revive And holiness be there, and all the sphere Be filled with happy altars where shall thrive The mystic plants of faith and hope to bear Immortal fruitage of sweet charity; For I believe that every piety, And every thirst for truth is gift divine, The gifts of God are not to me unclean Though strangely honoured at an unknown shrine. In temples of the past my spirit fain For old-time strength and vigour would implore As in a ruined abbey, fairer for "The unimaginable touch of time" We long for the sincerity of yore. But this is not man's mood, in his regime Sweet "calm decay" becomes mischance unmeet, And dying creeds sink to extinction, Hooted, and scorned, and sepultured in hate, Denied their rosary of good deeds and boon Of reverence and holy unction-- First in the list of crimes man writes defeat. These purest dreams of this our low estate, White-robed vestals, fond and vain designs, I lay a wreath at your forgotten shrines.