Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Sidor ...
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
SKETCHES. 297
condition to condition,” says the modern Simon Stylites,
Aabye Kjerkegaard, sitting upon his solitary pillar, staring
at the sky, and now and then spitting at the people round
about him on earth. Upon the direction of this movement
depends the condition in which we ultimately remain, or
rather to which we arrive, for stop we cannot, unless we
beconie spiritually petrified.
“ As we do not,” says the Danish prophet just nrentioned,
“rise from the Christian, the unsophisticated, to become
eventually interesting, witty, an artist, philosopher, states-
man, etc., etc.; but as on the contrary, out of all these
through reflection we become in all more and more a hum-
ble Christian,” in the same manner also the true aim of
life ought to let our petty passions, our love for such and
such a one, for this or that, and above all our self-love, fall
away, or rather be absorbed, lost, or glorified in our love
for — Love itself, the only lovable, ever yiclding, ever ful-
filling spirit. Absorbed in’ that spirit, man turns again’
towards the world of humanity, not like the Danish Simon
Stylites, but with a new love, more general, but there-
fore not the less warm; no, fiery and pure, like that of the
highest Being whose child itis. That.is thy aim, loving
heart! Blessed art thou who reachest it ! :
Thus much about life’s “condition.” I return to my
window. Both window and condition are not any longer
the same as those in the picture thirty years ago. All is
changed. Only some pieces of the old furniture remind
me of the old home. ‘Those people who in it constituted
the delight or the misery of my life, are all gone, dead, or
away. There is much besides death, which separates peo-
ple. The heart which then— but hush, hush, or it will
bleed, from the memory of the life, the faith, the love, of
which it then was capable. It still beats warmly, although
for other objects. Thirty years of a life, rich in important
events and changes, more rich than all the tropically bril-
liant and warm dreams of youth, have flown past, but not
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
