For though not sweeter his own Homer sings, Yet is his life the more endearing song.’ Note 46, page 142. Whoever has attempted to concentrate his thoughts in fixed contemplation upon the origin of the human race, the object of our present existence, and our prospects beyond it, upon the character and plan of the divinity, and the mode of his being, must have felt a painful vagueness, a dizzying sense of the weakness of our powers, very naturally preparing us for superstitious and terrific views of the first cause. But when, in the clear light of reason, I look upon his creation, on his star-spangled firmament, and the glory of his works, I should as soon doubt my own existence, as the perfect wisdom and goodness of the author of my being. All religion, which does not strengthen our confidence in this, must be a dreary illusion. Horrible dreams, dating their origin from the associations of childhood, and the rant of wild and visionary ministers, may sometimes interpose, in the uncertain moments between sleeping and waking, as among the gloomy presentiments and partial delirium of ill health. But every rational mind must finally settle to repose in that glorious persuasion, which instantly irradiates the moral universe with perennial sunshine. ‘The Lord reigneth; let the earth rejoice.’ In this or any other world, in our present or any other forms of conscious being, we may advance upon the unexplored scenes with a full confidence that we can never travel beyond the beneficence and equity of the infinite mind.