"Good-night, then," I said.
"Good-night. Sleep as well as I shall."
It was still early and I went to the studio to read a little before
I went to bed. But I found a book was not a thing one could attend
to, and I sat doing nothing, scarcely even thinking. I did not want
to think; all I wanted to do was to _look at_ what was going on here.
Thought, with its perplexities and conjectures and burrowings, did not
touch the heart of the situation. I could only contemplate; the best
friend I had in the world lay dying, and yet there must be no sorrow.
He was too utterly triumphant; banners and trumpets were assembling for
his passing, and he called on the joy of the world to congratulate him.
He was not dying, in his view, any more than a man dies who leaves a
little sphere for a larger one. Death was not closing in upon him, but
opening out for him! I saw him walking, not through a dark valley, but
upon hill-tops at the approach of dawn, and soon for him the dim night
world would burst into light and colour. Already had he been through
the night, and now he lay there with morning in his eyes, assured of
day. All that he waited for now was the dimming of the terrestrial
stars, and the flooding with sun of the infinite heavens. He knew it;
all I could decently do was to try to look at it through his eyes and
not through my own, which were blinded with tears that should never
have been shed....
I did not doubt the truth of his conviction, I knew it in my bones. But
the flesh on my bones was weak, and it cried out for him.