--It was all most
unearthly, dreamlike, a strange phantasmagoria, like some scene from
'The Ancient Mariner'--all the world shut out, silent, invisible, and
we floating along there alone, like a fairy ship creeping through
Chaos and the unknown Limbo. Was it an evil thought that rose within
me as I said to Claude--'Is not this too like life? Our only light
the sparkles that rise up round us at every step, and die behind us;
and all around, and all before, the great black unfathomable
eternities? A few souls brought together as it were by chance, for a
short friendship and mutual dependence in this little ship of earth,
so soon to land her passengers and break up the company for ever?'
He smiled.
'There is a devil's meaning to everything in nature, and a God's
meaning, too. Your friends, the zoologists, have surely taught you
better than that. As I read Nature's parable to-night, I find
nothing in it but hope. What if there be darkness, the sun will rise
to-morrow. What if there seem a chaos: the great organic world is
still living, and growing, and feeding, unseen by us, all the black
night through; and every phosphoric atom there below is a sign that
even in the darkest night there is still the power of light, ready to
flash out, wherever and however it is stirred.
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