into the
habitable world, the first law of Nature is inequality."

"Harsh doctrine, if applied to states. Are the cruel disparities of life
never to be removed?"

"Disparities of the PHYSICAL life? Oh, let us hope so. But disparities
of the INTELLECTUAL and the MORAL, never! Universal equality of
intelligence, of mind, of genius, of virtue!--no teacher left to the
world! no men wiser, better than others,--were it not an impossible
condition, WHAT A HOPELESS PROSPECT FOR HUMANITY! No, while the world
lasts, the sun will gild the mountain-top before it shines upon the
plain. Diffuse all the knowledge the earth contains equally over all
mankind to-day, and some men will be wiser than the rest to-morrow. And
THIS is not a harsh, but a loving law,--the REAL law of improvement;
the wiser the few in one generation, the wiser will be the multitude the
next!"

As Zanoni thus spoke, they moved on through the smiling gardens, and the
beautiful bay lay sparkling in the noontide. A gentle breeze just cooled
the sunbeam, and stirred the ocean; and in the inexpressible clearness
of the atmosphere there was something that rejoiced the senses. The very
soul seemed to grow lighter and purer in that lucid air.

"And these men, to commence their era of improvement and equality, are
jealous even of the Creator. They would deny an intelligence,--a God!"
said Zanoni, as if involuntarily. "Are you an artist, and, looking on
the world, can you listen to such a dogma? Between God and genius there
is a necessary link,--there is almost a correspondent language. Well
said the Pythagorean (Sextus, the Pythagorean.), 'A good intellect is
the chorus of divinity.'"

Struck and touched with these sentiments, which he little expected to
fall from one to whom he ascribed those powers which the superstitions
of childhood ascribe to the darker agencies, Glyndon said: "And yet you
have confessed that your life, separated from that of others, is one
that man should dread to share. Is there, then, a connection between
magic and religion?"

"Magic!" And what is magic! When the traveller beholds in Persia the
ruins of palaces and temples, the ignorant inhabitants inform him they
were the work of magicians. What is beyond their own power, the vulgar
cannot comprehend to be lawfully in the power of others. But if by
magic you mean a perpetual research amongst all that is more latent and
obscure in Nature, I answer, I profess that magic, and that he who does