. . . . And now I begin to understand why I was
imprisoned so many years in this lonely chamber, and why I could never
break through the viewless bolts and bars; for if I had sooner made my
escape into the world, I should have grown hard and rough, and been
covered with earthly dust, and my heart might have become callous by rude
encounters with the multitude. . . . . But living in solitude till the
fulness of time was come, I still kept the dew of my youth and the
freshness of my heart. . . . . I used to think I could imagine all
passions, all feelings, and states of the heart and mind; but how little
did I know! . . . . Indeed, we are but shadows; we are not endowed with
real life, and all that seems most real about us is but the thinnest
substance of a dream,--till the heart be touched. That touch creates
us,--then we begin to be,--thereby we are beings of reality and
inheritors of eternity. . . . .
When we shall be endowed with our spiritual bodies, I think that they
will be so constituted that we may send thoughts and feelings any
distance in no time at all, and transfuse them warm and fresh into the
consciousness of those whom we love.
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