"He, many an evening, to his distant home In solitude returning, saw the hills Grow larger in the darkness, all alone Beheld the stars come out above his head, And traveled through the wood, with no one near To whom he might confess the things he saw. So the foundations of his mind were laid. In such communion, not from terror free, While yet a child, and long before his time, He had perceived the presence and the power Of greatness." "He had received a precious gift," the poet tells us, that gift of spiritual perception which the poet himself tells he also has received. "Thus informed, He had small need of books: In the fixed lineaments of nature, rocks and caves, Even in their fixed and steady lineaments, He traced an ebbing and a flowing mind, Expression ever varied." There "was wanting yet the pure delight of love" in his inspiration, but that came also, and-- "Such was the boy; but for the growing youth What soul was his, when, from the naked top Of some bold headland, he beheld the sun Rise up, and bathe the world in light! He looked-- Ocean and earth, the solid frame of earth And ocean's liquid mass, beneath him lay In gladness and deep joy. The clouds were touched, And in their silent faces did he read Unutterable love. Sound needed none, Nor any voice of joy; his spirit drank The spectacle: sensation, soul, and form All melted into him: they swallowed up His animal being; in them did he live, And by them did he live: they were his life. _In such access of mind, in such high hour Of visitation from the living God, Thought was not: in enjoyment it expired._ No thanks he breathed, he proffered no request, _Rapt into still communion that transcends The imperfect offices of prayer and praise, His mind was a thanksgiving to the Power That made him; it was blessedness and love_!" That is one of the finest pieces of Quakerism that ever was written; there is nothing in George Fox himself more perfect. It is a description of that state to which every true Quaker aspires; which he believes attainable without the mediation of any priest, or the presence of any church; which Fox and the early Friends so often describe as having been accorded to them in the midst of their public meetings, or in the solitude of the closet, or the journey. It is that state of exaltation, the very flower and glorious moment of a religious life, which is the privilege of him who draws near to and walks with God. That "Access of mind, Of visitation from the living God," when "Thought is not; in enjoyment it expires." It is an eloquent exposition of the genuine worship to which, according to the Friends, every sincere seeker may and will be admitted, when