But an evil day comes to all in the drama of being. It waits through the life of king and of beggar. It leaves traces on the history of every mortal born from woman, and it can neither be seared away, entreated, nor propitiated. Health is a dewdrop that falls from the heavens to vivify the blossoms on earth, only during the morn'. of life, its spring and summer . . . It has but a short duration and returns from whence it came -- the invisible realms.

How oft'neath the bud that is brightest and fairest, The seeds of the canker in embryo lurk! How oft at the root of the flower that is rarest -- Secure in its ambush the worm is at work. . . . . ."

The running sand which moves downward in the glass, wherein the hours of human life are numbered, runs swifter. The worm has gnawed the blossom of health through its heart. The strong body is found stretched one day on the thorny bed of pain.

The Soul-Ego beams no longer. It sits still and looks sadly out of what has become its dungeon windows, on the world which is now rapidly being shrouded for it in the funeral palls of suffering. Is it the eve of night eternal which is nearing?