One of his father's ministers having
discovered him, revealed to him what he was, and the misconception
of his character was removed, and he knew himself to be a prince.
So soul," continues the Hindoo philosopher, "from the circumstances
in which it is placed, mistakes its own character, until the truth
is revealed to it by some holy teacher, and then it knows itself to
be Brahme." I perceive that we inhabitants of New England live this
mean life that we do because our vision does not penetrate the
surface of things. We think that that is which appears to be. If a
man should walk through this town and see only the reality, where,
think you, would the "Mill-dam" go to? If he should give us an
account of the realities he beheld there, we should not recognize
the place in his description. Look at a meeting-house, or a
court-house, or a jail, or a shop, or a dwelling-house, and say what
that thing really is before a true gaze, and they would all go to
pieces in your account of them. Men esteem truth remote, in the
outskirts of the system, behind the farthest star, before Adam and
after the last man.
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