Page:Romance & Reality 2.pdf/324

322 incredulity—your warm feelings turn to poison, or to a void; their empire divided between bitterness and exhaustion. Where is the good you exalted?—a scoff even to yourself; where is the love that you trusted?—like the reed on which you leant, it has entered into your side, and even if the wound cease to bleed, it is only because it has hardened into a scar; where is the praise you desired?—gone to another, or if still yours, you know its emptiness and its falsehood. You loathe others; but you look within yourself, and see their counterpart. All do not think this, because many do not think at all; but all feel it, though they do not analyse their feelings." It was now late: slowly, and somewhat sadly, Edward rose, and bade his friend good night—he said it somewhat more affectionately than usual. He knew him to be an old and a disappointed man, and he deemed rightly, that to argue with such a mood was to pain, not to convince. Yet, as he rode home, more than once the reins dropped on his horse's neck, and he thought mournfully, "are such things sooth?" I know not. I own I think they are. I have this very moment laid down the most eloquent, the most beautiful avowal of belief in