Was not the sleep of this man his real life, and a scene of happiness? Could he wish for reality who had enjoyed such a dream? For if in life there were equal sleep and waking, and the sleep were all a happy dream, this would indeed be a happy life.
May I tell you, Evelyn, that I enjoyed a deep sublimity of feeling, a consciousness of that mental emancipation which devout philosophers have more than glanced at?
Ida. Although you have again rather run wild, Astrophel, I agree with you in thinking that, under this influence, the dream may be an illustration of Plato’s notion, regarding the existence of eternal forms, independent of matter,—an emanation of the divine mind imparted to that of human beings; that innate idea, if you will, by which the mind views at large —
“The uncreated images of things.”
And I therefore revere the opinion of Sir Thomas Brown, the ingenious author of the “Religio Medici,” (with whom believed Sir Henry Wotton, Bossuet, and other good men,) “That we are somewhat more than ourselves in our sleeps, and the slumber of the body seems to be but the waking of the soul. It is the legation of sense, but the liberty of reason; and our waking conceptions do not match the fancies of our sleeps.” And also the sentiment of Addison, that “there seems something in this consideration, that intimates to us a natural grandeur and perfection of the soul.”
Cast. In your temple of transcendental philosophy you will leave a niche for Shakspere, dearest Ida, who, even in one of his lightest characters, forgets not this perfection of our emancipated spirit. Lorenzo whispers to the fair Jewess, in the garden at Belmont —
“Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of heav’n
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold!
There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st,
But in his motion, like an angel sings,