THE FOOL ERRANT - World eBook Library - World Public Library

leaving them at home he should either seem so poor as to be without them, or so rich as to be able to discard them. But here,
what a difference! Not only is man naked before God, but God stands naked before man. The church is their common ground;
the church is their inn, and the blessed table their market ordinary. At this board, God and man, man and the saints, meet as
friends. The sweetest intercourse possible on earth is not denied them. They may be gossips, God and man; they may be lovers,
bosom friends. Is this not a hopeful estate for the tried and erring, naturally affectionate soul? I trow that it is.
And as with Honour, as with Religion, so with that child of the pair, so with Love. Boy and maid, man and woman, in this
country stand as children hand in hand before their parent, who is God. Hand in hand, in seemly innocence, naked, without
shame, or underthought or afterthought, they stray about the flowery meads. Their hearts are by chance enkindled, each burns,
fire seeks the embrace of fire; they touch, they mingle, they soar together. Wedded love, which neither soars nor leaps like a
furnace, but glows steadily with equable and radiant heat—wedded love ensues this passionate commingling. But the pair
remain what they were at first, simple, naked, unashamed, unshameful, with all things displayed, even to the very aspirations of
the secret soul, in blessed sympathy, in union blessed and to be blessed.
Such, I say, may be, and indeed is, the case with many honoured, wedded pairs observed by me. Such, I thank God, has been
my own lot, since that day when, after long tribulation, I took Virginia into my arms and held her to my breast. But of that, and
of her, I dare write no more. Judge me favourably, reader, for her sake; and so farewell.
LUCCA, October 20, 1741.
[Mr. Strelley lived, I believe, until the spring of 1759, and was buried behind the altar of San Romano. His house, now a
hospital, is still intact, and may be visited by the curious, as it was by me.—M. H.]
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