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197 night, quitted this sepulchre of my existence, indifferent which road my horse should take; for now on this side the grave I had neither wishes, hopes, nor fears.

After a short time I was joined by a traveller on foot, who, after walking for a while by the side of my horse, observed that as we both seemed to be travelling the same road, he should beg my permission to lay his cloak on the horse's back behind me, to which I silently assented. He thanked me with easy politeness for this trifling favor, praised my horse, and then took occasion to extol the happiness and the power of the rich, and fell, I scarcely know how, into a sort of conversation with himself, in which I merely acted the part of listener. He unfolded his views of human life and of the world, and, touching on metaphysics, demanded an answer from that cloudy science to the question of questions—the answer that should solve all mysteries. He deduced one problem from another in a very lucid manner, and then proceeded to their solution.

You may remember, my dear friend, that after having run through the school-philosophy, I became sensible of my unfitness for metaphysical speculations, and therefore totally abstained from engaging in them. Since then I have acquiesced in some things, and abandoned all hope of