"You must confess, that I wield a strange kind of intellectual supremacy over all those by whom I am in this life surrounded; and to possess and exercise this privilege, is, I believe, much more easy for a woman than for a man. Not only, however, must we for this purpose enjoy that superiority of personal beauty which Nature has granted to us, but also many peculiar attributes of mind. Above all, the individual, who, in such undertakings, expects to succeed, must possess the power of stepping, as it were, out of herself,--of contemplating her _own individuality_ from an external point, (that is to say, as it is beheld by others;) for our own identity, when viewed in this manner, serves like an obedient implement--a passive means of obtaining whatever object we have proposed to ourselves, as the highest and most desirable in life. "Can there be anything more admirable than an existence which rules over that of others, so that we may exert perfect empire over the insipid beings--the phantom shapes, by which we are here surrounded, and command them, as if by magic spells, to minister to our enjoyments? "You, Victorin, belong to the few who have hitherto understood me. You had also acquired this power of looking, as if with others' eyes, upon yourself; and I have therefore judged you not unworthy to be raised as my partner on the throne of this intellectual kingdom. The mystery which we were obliged to keep up, heightened the charm of this union; our apparent separation only gave wider scope for our fantastic humour, which played with and scorned the conventional laws of ordinary life. "Do not our present meetings constitute the boldest piece of adventure, that spirits, mocking at all conventional limitations, ever dared to encounter? Even in this new character which you have assumed, the metamorphosis depends not on your dress merely. It seems, also, as if the mind, accommodating itself to the ruling principle, worked outwardly in such a manner, that even the bodily form becomes plastic and obedient, moulding itself in turns, according to that plan and destination which the higher powers of volition had conceived and laid down. "How completely I myself despise all ordinary rules, you, Victorin, are already aware. The Baron has now become, in my estimation, a disgusting, worn-out implement, which, having been used for my past purposes, lies dead, like a run-down piece of clock-work, before me--Reinhold is too contemptible and narrow-minded to be worthy of a thought--Aurelia is a good, pious, and simple-hearted child--We have nothing to do but with Hermogen.