The innocent nature of the girl had begun to recoil from
what she saw in the woman of the world, and yet she had in herself
worldliness enough to render her fully susceptible of her influences.
Notwithstanding her fine health and natural spirits, Florimel had
begun to know what it is to wake suddenly of a morning between
three and four, and lie for a long weary time, sleepless. In youth
bodily fatigue ensures falling asleep, but as soon as the body is
tolerably rested, if there be unrest in the mind, that wakes it,
and consciousness returns in the shape of a dull misgiving like the
far echo of the approaching trump of the archangel. Indeed, those
hours are as a vestibule to the great hall of judgment, and to such
as, without rendering it absolute obedience, yet care to keep on
some sort of terms with their conscience, is a time of anything but
comfort. Nor does the court in those hours sitting, concern itself
only with heavy questions of right or wrong, but whoever loves
and cares himself for his appearance before the eyes of men, finds
himself accused of paltry follies, stupidities, and indiscretions,
and punished with paltry mortifications, chagrins, and anxieties.
From such arraignment no man is free but him who walks in the perfect
law of liberty--that is, the will of the Perfect--which alone
is peace.
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