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prayer:- "My God! from thy hand I will accept all--for me all: but
deign most wonderfully to strengthen the hearts of those to whom I
was so very dear! Grant thou that I may cease to be such to them
now; and that not the life of the least of them may be shortened by
their care for me, even by a single day!"

Strange! wonderful power of prayer! for several hours my mind was
raised to a contemplation of the Deity, and my confidence in His
goodness proportionately increased; I meditated also on the dignity
of the human mind when, freed from selfishness, it exerts itself to
will only that which is the will of eternal wisdom. This can be
done, and it is man's duty to do it. Reason, which is the voice of
the Deity, teaches us that it is right to submit to every sacrifice
for the sake of virtue. And how could the sacrifice which we owe to
virtue be completed, if in the most trying afflictions we struggle
against the will of Him who is the source of all virtue? When death
on the scaffold, or any other species of martyrdom becomes
inevitable, it is a proof of wretched degradation, or ignorance, not
to be able to approach it with blessing upon our lips. Nor is it
only necessary we should submit to death, but to the affliction
which we know those most dear to us must suffer on our account. All
it is lawful for us to ask is, that God will temper such affliction,
and that he will direct us all, for such a prayer is always sure to
be accepted.



CHAPTER XVI.



For a period of some days I continued in the same state of mind; a
sort of calm sorrow, full of peace, affection, and religious
thoughts. I seemed to have overcome every weakness, and as if I
were no longer capable of suffering new anxiety. Fond delusion! it
is man's duty to aim at reaching as near to perfection as possible,
though he can never attain it here. What now disturbed me was the
sight of an unhappy friend, my good Piero, who passed along the
gallery within a few yards of me, while I stood at my window. They
were removing him from his cell into the prison destined for
criminals. He was hurried by so swiftly that I had barely time to
recognise him, and to receive and return his salutation.

Poor young man! in the flower of his age, with a genius of high
promise, of frank, upright, and most affectionate disposition, born
with a keen zest of the pleasures of existence, to be at once
precipitated into a dungeon, without the remotest hope of escaping
the severest penalty of the laws. So great was my compassion for
him, and my regret at being unable to afford him the slightest
consolation, that it was long before I could recover my composure of
mind. I knew how tenderly he was attached to every member of his
numerous family, how deeply interested in promoting their happiness,
and how devotedly his affection was returned. I was sensible what
must be the affliction of each and all under so heavy a calamity.

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