It was to the perfect Order he should find in that state upon which he was about to enter, that the judicious Hooker looked forward at his death with placid and profound contentment. Because he had been employed in contending against a spirit of insubordination and schism which soon proved fatal to his country; and because his life had been passed under the perpetual discomfort of domestic discord, the happiness of Heaven seemed, in his estimation, to consist primarily in Order, as indeed in all human societies this is the first thing needful. The discipline which Mr. Bacon had undergone was very different in kind: what he delighted to think, was, that the souls of those whom death and redemption have made perfect, are in a world where there is no change, nor parting, where nothing fades, nothing passes away and is no more seen, but the good and the beautiful are permanent. _Miser, chi speme in cosa mortal pone; Ma, chi non ve la pone?_[3] [Footnote 3: PETRARCH.] When Wilkie was in the Escurial, looking at Titian's famous picture of the Last Supper, in the Refectory there, an old Jeronimite said to him, “I have sate daily in sight of that picture for now nearly three-score years; during that time my companions have dropt off, one after another,—all who were my seniors, all who were my contemporaries, and many, or most of those who were younger than myself; more than one generation has passed away, and there the figures in the picture have remained unchanged! I look at them till I sometimes think that they are the realities, and we but shadows!” I wish I could record the name of the Monk by whom that natural feeling was so feelingly and strikingly expressed. “The shows of things are better than themselves,” says the author of the Tragedy of Nero, whose name also, I could wish had been forthcoming; and the classical reader will remember the lines of Sophocles:— Ὁρῶ γὰρ ἡμᾶς οὐδὲν ὄντας ἄλλο, πλἡν Ἔιδωλ᾽, ὅσοιπερ ζῶμεν, ἤ κούφην σκιάν.[4] [Footnote 4: SOPHOCLES.] These are reflections which should make us think Of that same time when no more change shall be, But stedfast rest of all things, firmly stayd Upon the pillars of Eternity, That is contraire to mutability; For all that moveth doth in change delight: But thenceforth all shall rest eternally With Him that is the God of Sabaoth hight, O that great Sabaoth God grant me that sabbath's sight![5] [Footnote 5: SPENCER.] CHAPTER XCVIII. CHRISTIAN CONSOLATION. OPINIONS CONCERNING THE SPIRITS OF THE DEAD. The voice which I did more esteem Than music in her sweetest key; Those eyes which unto me did seem More comfortable than the day; Those now by me, as they have been, Shall never more be heard, or seen; But what I once enjoyed in them, Shall seem hereafter as a dream.