And, lo! as the archangel spake, the stars beheld a young and all-lustrous stranger on the throne of the erring star; and his face was so soft to look upon that the dimmest of human eyes might have gazed upon its splendour unabashed: but the dark fiend alone was dazzled by its lustre, and, with a yell that shook the flaming pillars of the universe, he plunged backward into the gloom. Then, far and sweet from the arch unseen, came forth the voice of God,-- “Behold! on the throne of the discontented star sits the star of Hope; and he that breathed into mankind the religion of Fear hath a successor in him who shall teach earth the religion of Love!” And evermore the star of Fear dwells with Lucifer, and the star of Love keeps vigil in heaven! CHAPTER XX. GLENHAUSEN.--THE POWER OF LOVE IN SANCTIFIED PLACES.--A PORTRAIT OF FREDERICK BARBAROSSA.--THE AMBITION OF MEN FINDS NO ADEQUATE SYMPATHY IN WOMEN. “YOU made me tremble for you more than once,” said Gertrude to the student; “I feared you were about to touch upon ground really sacred, but your end redeemed all.” “The false religion always tries to counterfeit the garb, the language, the aspect of the true,” answered the German; “for that reason, I purposely suffered my tale to occasion that very fear and anxiety you speak of, conscious that the most scrupulous would be contented when the whole was finished.” This German was one of a new school, of which England as yet knows nothing. We shall see hereafter what it will produce. The student left them at Friedberg, and our travellers proceeded to Glenhausen,--a spot interesting to lovers; for here Frederick the First was won by the beauty of Gela, and, in the midst of an island vale, he built the Imperial Palace, in honour of the lady of his love. This spot is, indeed, well chosen of itself; the mountains of the Rhinegeburg close it in with the green gloom of woods and the glancing waters of the Kinz. “Still, wherever we go,” said Trevylyan, “we find all tradition is connected with love; and history, for that reason, hallows less than romance.” “It is singular,” said Vane, moralizing, “that love makes but a small part of our actual lives, but is yet the master-key to our sympathies. The hardest of us, who laugh at the passion when they see it palpably before them, are arrested by some dim tradition of its existence in the past. It is as if life had few opportunities of bringing out certain qualities within us, so that they always remain untold and dormant, susceptible to thought, but deaf to action.” “You refine and mystify too much,” said Trevylyan, smiling; “none of us have any faculty, any passion, uncalled forth, if we have _really_ loved, though but for a day.” Gertrude smiled, and drawing her arm within his, Trevylyan left Vane to philosophize on passion,--a fit occupation for one who had never felt it.