"One biography may help conjecture or satisfy reason concerning the
story of a thousand unrecorded lives. And how few even of the deserving
among the multitude can deserve, as 'dear sons of memory,' to be shrined
in the public heart. Few of us die unwept, but most of us unwritten. We
shall find a grave--less certainly a tombstone--and with much less
likelihood a biographer. Those 'bright particular' stars that at evening
look towards us from afar, yet still are individual in the distance, are
at clearest times but about a thousand; but the milky lustre that runs
through mid heaven is composed of a million million lights, which are
not the less separate because seen undistinguishably. Absorbed, not
lost, in the multitude of the unrecorded, our private dear ones make
part in this mild, blissful shining of the 'general assembly,' the great
congregation of the skies. Thus the past is aglow with the unwritten,
the nameless. The leaders, sons of fame, conspicuous in lustre, eminent
in place; these are the few, whose great individuality burns with
distinct, starry light through the dark of ages. Such stars, without the
starry way, would not teach us the vastness of heaven; and the 'way,'
without these, were not sufficient to gladden and glorify the night with
pomp of Hierarchical Ascents of Domination.
Pages:
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286