his very gainsayers, as he had
from hers, gathered wonder, gathered favor for him? Was the attraction,
the agitation mutual, then; pole and pole trembling towards contact,
when once brought into neighborhood? Say rather, heart swelling in
presence of the Queen of Hearts; like the Sea swelling when once
near its Moon! With the Wanderer it was even so: as in heavenward
gravitation, suddenly as at the touch of a Seraph's wand, his whole soul
is roused from its deepest recesses; and all that was painful and that
was blissful there, dim images, vague feelings of a whole Past and a
whole Future, are heaving in unquiet eddies within him.

"Often, in far less agitating scenes, had our still Friend shrunk
forcibly together; and shrouded up his tremors and flutterings, of
what sort soever, in a safe cover of Silence, and perhaps of seeming
Stolidity. How was it, then, that here, when trembling to the core of
his heart, he did not sink into swoons, but rose into strength, into
fearlessness and clearness? It was his guiding Genius (_Damon_) that
inspired him; he must go forth and meet his Destiny. Show thyself now,
whispered it, or be forever hid. Thus sometimes it is even when your
anxiety becomes transcendental, that the soul first feels herself able
to transcend it; that she rises above it, in fiery victory; and borne on
new-found wings of victory, moves so calmly, even because so rapidly,
so irresistibly. Always must the Wanderer remember, with a certain
satisfaction and surprise, how in this case he sat not silent but struck
adroitly into the stream of conversation; which thenceforth, to speak
with an apparent not a real vanity, he may say that he continued to
lead. Surely, in those hours, a certain inspiration was imparted him,
such inspiration as is still possible in our late era. The self-secluded
unfolds himself in noble thoughts, in free, glowing words; his soul is
as one sea of light, the peculiar home of Truth and Intellect; wherein
also Fantasy bodies forth form after form, radiant with all prismatic
hues."

It appears, in this otherwise so happy meeting, there talked one
"Philisitine;" who even now, to the general weariness, was dominantly
pouring forth Philistinism (_Philistriositaten_.); little witting what
hero was here entering to demolish him! We omit the series of Socratic,
or rather Diogenic utterances, not unhappy in their way, whereby the
monster, "persuaded into silence," seems soon after to have withdrawn