of stating the same, contradiction can only occur of the same thing,--all opinions are thus synonyms, are synonymous, are the same. But the same phrase by difference of emphasis is two; and here again difference and no-difference merge in one. It is impossible to convey an idea of the torrential character of the identification of opposites as it streams through the mind in this experience. I have sheet after sheet of phrases dictated or written during the intoxication, which to the sober reader seem meaningless drivel, but which at the moment of transcribing were fused in the fire of infinite rationality. God and devil, good and evil, life and death, I and thou, sober and drunk, matter and form, black and white, quantity and quality, shiver of ecstasy and shudder of horror, vomiting and swallowing, inspiration and expiration, fate and reason, great and small, extent and intent, joke and earnest, tragic and comic, and fifty other {296} contrasts figure in these pages in the same monotonous way. The mind saw how each term _belonged_ to its contrast through a knife-edge moment of transition which _it_ effected, and which, perennial and eternal, was the _nunc stans_ of life. The thought of mutual implication of the parts in the bare form of a judgment of opposition, as 'nothing--but,' 'no more--than,' 'only--if,' etc., produced a perfect delirium of theoretic rapture. And at last, when definite ideas to work on came slowly, the mind went through the mere _form_ of recognizing sameness in identity by contrasting the same word with itself, differently emphasized, or shorn of its initial letter. Let me transcribe a few sentences: What's mistake but a kind of take? What's nausea but a kind of -ausea? Sober, drunk, -_unk_, astonishment. Everything can become the subject of criticism--how criticise without something _to_ criticise? Agreement--disagreement!! Emotion--motion!!! Die away from, _from_, die away (without the _from_). Reconciliation of opposites; sober, drunk, all the same! Good and evil reconciled in a laugh! It escapes, it escapes! But---- What escapes, WHAT escapes? Emphasis, EMphasis; there must be some emphasis in order for there to be a phasis. No verbiage can give it, because the verbiage is _other_. _In_coherent, coherent--same. And it fades! And it's infinite! AND it's infinite! If it was n't _going_, why should you hold on to it? Don't you see the difference, don't you see the identity? Constantly opposites united! The same me telling you to write and not to write! Extreme--extreme, extreme! Within the _ex_tensity that 'extreme' contains is contained the '_extreme_' of intensity. Something, and _other_ than that thing! Intoxication, and _otherness_ than intoxication. Every attempt at betterment,--every attempt at otherment,--is a----. It fades forever and forever as we move. {297}