Of the two works of Traherne which Dobell rescued from oblivion, on both of which we shall draw for our exposition, one contains his poems, the other his prose writings. The title of the latter is Centuries of Meditations. The title page of one of the two manuscripts containing the collection of the poetical writings introduces these as Poems of Felicity, Containing Divine Reflections on the Native Objects of an Infant-Eye. As regards the title 'Centuries of Meditations' we are ignorant of the meaning Traherne may have attached to it, and what he meant by calling the four parts of the book, 'First', 'Second', etc., Century. The book itself represents a manual of devotion for meditative study by the reader. Let our first quotation be one from the opening paragraph of the third 'Century' in which Traherne introduces himself as the bearer of certain uncommon powers of memory and, arising from these powers, a particular mission as a teacher: 'Those pure and virgin apprehensions I had from the womb, and that divine light wherewith I was born are the best unto this day, wherein I can see the Universe. By the gift of God they attended me into the world, and by His special favour I remember them till now. Verily they seem the greatest gifts His wisdom could bestow, for without them all other gifts had been dead and vain. They are unattainable by books, and therefore I will teach them by experience.' (Ill, 1.) The picture thus remaining with him of his nature of soul in his earliest years on earth he describes as follows: 'Certainly Adam in Paradise had not more sweet and curious apprehensions of the world, than I when I was a child. All appeared new, and strange at first, inexpressibly rare and delightful and beautiful. I was a little stranger, which at my entrance into the world was saluted and surrounded with innumerable joys. My knowledge was Divine. I knew by intuition those things which since my Apostacy, I collected again by the highest reason. I was entertained like an Angel with the works of God in their splendour and glory, I saw all in the peace of Eden; Heaven and Earth did sing my Creator's praises, and could not make more melody to Adam, than to me. All Time was Eternity, and a perpetual Sabbath. Is it not strange, that an infant should be the heir of the whole world, and see those mysteries which the books of the learned never unfold?' (Ill, 1, 2.) In a different form the same experience comes to expression in the opening lines of Traherne's poem, Wonder: 'How like an Angel came I down! How bright are all things here I When first among his Works I did appear O how their GLORY did me crown! The World resembled his ETERNITIE, In which my Soul did Walk; And evry Thing that I did see Did with me talk.'8