Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. I.djvu/188

 for God is here within. Let our simplicity judge them, and our docility to our own law demonstrate the poverty of nature and fortune, beside our native rulers.



“We must go alone. I like the silent church before the service begins better than any preaching. How far off, how cool, how chaste the persons look, begirt each one with a precinct or sanctuary. So let us always sit. * * But your isolation must not be mechanical, but spiritual, that is, must be devotion. * * The power which men possess to annoy me I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come near me but through my own act. What we desire, that we have; but by desire we bereave ourselves of the love.

“If we cannot at once rise to the sanctities of obedience and faith, let us at least resist our temptations; let us enter into the state of war, and wake Thor and Wodin, courage and constancy, in our breast. This is to be done in our smooth times by speaking the truth. Check this lying hospitality and lying affection. Live no longer to the expectation of those deceived and deceiving people with whom we converse. Say to them, O father! O mother! O wife! O brother! O friend! I have lived with you after appearances hitherto. Be it known unto you that henceforward I obey no law less than the eternal law. I shall endeavour to nourish my parents, to support my family, to be the chaste husband of one wife,—but these relations I must fill after a new and unprecedented way. I appeal from your customs. I must be myself. I cannot break myself any longer for you, or you. If you can love me for what I am, we shall be the happier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I must be myself. I will not hide my tastes or aversions. I will so trust that what is deep is holy that I will do strongly before the sun and moon whatever inly rejoices me and my heart appoints. If you are noble I will love you; if