ever lingering near the gates I spoke of, that you can discover the divine in the soul. Then will you be able to say with the great Jean Paul: ‘When I desire to love most tenderly one who is dear to me, and wish to forgive him everything, I have but to look at him for a few moments in silence.’ To learn to love, one must first learn to see. ‘I lived for twenty years by my sister’s side,’ said a friend to me, one day, ‘and _I saw her_ for the first time at the moment of our mother’s death.’ Here, too, it had been necessary that death should violently fling open an eternal gate, so that two souls might behold each other in a ray of the primeval light. Is there one amongst us who has not near to him sisters he has never seen? Happily, even in those whose vision is most limited, there is always something that acts in silence as though they had seen. It is possible, perhaps, that to be good is only to be in a little light what all are in darkness. Therefore, doubtless, is it well that we should endeavour to raise our life, and should strive towards summits where ill-doing becomes impossible. And therefore, too, is it well to accustom the eye to behold events and men in a divine atmosphere. But even that is not indispensable; and how small must the difference seem to the eyes of a God! We are in a world where truth reigns at the bottom of things, and where it is not truth but falsehood that needs to be explained. If the happiness of your brother sadden you, do not despise yourself; you will not have to travel far along the road before you will come across something in yourself that will not be saddened. And even though you do not travel the road, it matters little: something there was that was not sad....