“I see nothing! Saulus, quiet thyself! behold all is well!”
Saulus crept back to his couch, more uncertain who and what he was than ever.
A hellish torment was within and without!
* * * * * * * * * *
As the first faint flush of dawn entered through the casement of his chamber, turning the blackness into gray, Saulus awoke from a half-conscious despair, and, wonder of wonders, a feeling of heavenly harmony possessed his soul! Peace, like a broad, glassy river, was borne in upon him.
“Am I Saulus?”
“Calm on the listening ear of night
Come Heaven’s melodious strains.”
Iridescent tints of beauty filled the room. His soul floated through, and was bathed in a symphony of harmonious sound-waves, sweeter than a thousand harps of Æolia. The atmosphere seemed charged with an impersonal and universal love, and its message was written in letters of light upon the walls of his chamber. The fragrance of roses was wafted in upon his bewildered senses. A heavenly chorus of benedictions, distant, but enchanting in quality, reached him, as though echoed and [pg 226]re-echoed through long corridors. He felt his soul expanding and responding, as he seemed to inhale a spirit of inspiration. An angelic visitor in white robes stood before him, and whispered, “I am Prophecy,” and with a winning smile pointed upward. What a vision! What brightness! What beauty!
“Have I died, and is this paradise? But see! It begins to fade! Stay, Oh, stay! Leave me not! No! no! no!”