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VIVIAN GREY.
71

and ineffable essence! Oh! I have lived in a land, where every mountain, and every stream, and every wood, and every ruin, has its legend, and its peculiar spirit; a land, in whose dark forests, the midnight hunter, with his spirit-shout, scares the slumbers of the trembling serf; a land, from whose winding rivers, the fair-haired Undine welcomes the belated traveller to her fond, and fatal, embrace; and you talk to me of omnipotent and ineffable essences! Oh! miserable mocker!—It is not true, Vivian Grey; you are but echoing the world's deceit, and even at this hour of the night, thou darest not speak as thou dost think. Thou worshippest no omnipotent and ineffable essence—thou believest in no omnipotent and ineffable essence; shrined in the secret chamber of your soul, there is an image, before which you bow down in adoration, and that image is——yourself. And truly when I do gaze upon thy radiant eyes," and here