Page:Popular Works of Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1889) Vol 2.djvu/82

 worlds, Ages produce new Ages, which stand in contemplation over those which have gone before, and bring to light the secret bond of connexion which unites causes and consequences within them. Then the grave opens,—not that which men heap together on the earth, but the grave of impenetrable darkness wherewith the first life has surrounded us,—and from out it arises the mighty power of Ideas, which sees in a new light the End in the Beginning, the Perfect in the Partial; every work however humble which springs from Faith in the Eternal is revealed, and the secret aspirations which are here imprisoned and bound down to earth soar upwards on unfettered pinions into a new and purer ether.

In one word: As when the breath of Spring enlivens the air the strong and fixed ice, which but a moment before imprisoned each atom within itself and shut up each neighbouring atom in similar isolation, now no longer maintains its rigid bondage but flows forth in one free, animated, and glowing flood; as the powers of Nature, which were before divided, and in their separation and antagonism produced only devastation and death, now rush together, embrace and interpenetrate each other, and in this free communion send forth a living balsam upon every sense; so does the Spirit-World not indeed flow together at the breath of Love, for in it there is no Winter, but there all is and abides in eternal communion with the mighty Whole. Nothing individual can live in itself or for itself, but all live in the Whole, and this Whole unceasingly dies for itself in unspeakable love, that it may rise again in new Life. This is the law of the spiritual world:—All that comes into existence falls a sacrifice to an eternally increasing and ascending Life; and this law constantly rules over all, without waiting for the consent of any. Here alone lies the distinction;—whether man allow himself to be led, with the halter round his head, like a beast, to the slaughter; or freely