A TIME will come, perhaps—and many things there are that herald its approach—a time will come perhaps when our souls will know of each other without the intermediary of the senses. Certain it is that there passes not a day but the soul adds to its ever-widening domain. It is very much nearer to our visible self, and takes a far greater part in all our actions, than was the case two or three centuries ago. A spiritual epoch is perhaps upon us; an epoch to which a certain number of analogies are found in history. For there are periods recorded, when the soul, in obedience to unknown laws, seemed to rise to the very surface of humanity, whence it gave clearest evidence of its existence and of its power. And this existence and this power reveal themselves in countless ways, diverse and unforeseen. It would seem, at moments such as these, as though humanity were on the point of struggling from beneath the crushing burden of matter that weighs it down. A spiritual influence is abroad that soothes and comforts; and the sternest, direst laws of Nature yield here and there. Men are nearer to themselves, nearer to their brothers; in the look of their eyes, in the love of their hearts, there is deeper earnestness and tenderer fellowship. Their understanding of women, children, animals, plants—nay, of all things—becomes more pitiful and more profound. The statues, paintings and writings that these men have left us may perhaps not be perfect, but, none the less does there dwell therein a secret power, an indescribable grace, held captive and imperishable for ever. A mysterious brotherhood and love must have shone forth from the eyes of these men; and signs of a life that we cannot explain are everywhere, vibrating by the side of the life of every day. Such knowledge as we possess of ancient Egypt induces us to believe that she passed through one of these spiritual epochs. At a very remote period in the history of India, the soul must have drawn very near to the surface of life, to a point, indeed, that it has never since touched; and unto this day strange phenomena owe their being to the recollection, or lingering remnants, of its almost immediate presence. Many other similar moments there have been, when the spiritual element seemed to be struggling far down in the depths of humanity, like a drowning man battling for life beneath the waters of a great river. Bethink you of Persia, for instance, of Alexandria, and the two mystic centuries of the Middle Ages.