"The question is, how can you argue at all about anything that is so plain and demonstrated a fact? The doctrine of evolution proves it. Everything that we were once has its part in us now. Suppose, if you like, that we were originally no more than shells on the shore,—some remnant of the nature of the shell must be in us at this moment. Nothing is lost,—nothing is wasted,—not even a thought. I carry my theories very far indeed, especially in regard to matters of love. I maintain that if it is decreed that the soul of a man and the soul of a woman must meet,—must rush together,—not all the forces of the universe can hinder them; aye, even if they were, for some conventional cause or circumstance, themselves reluctant to consummate their destiny, it would, nevertheless, despite them, be consummated. For mark you,—in some form or other they have rushed together before! Whether as flames in the air, or twining leaves on a tree, or flowers in a field, they have felt the sweetness and fitness of each other's being in former lives,—and the craving sense of that sweetness and fitness can never be done away with,—never! Not as long as this present universe lasts! It is a terrible thing," continued the Doctor in a lower tone, "a terrible fatality,—the desire of love. In some cases it is a curse; in others, a divine and priceless blessing. The results depend entirely on the temperaments of the human creatures possessed by its fever. When it kindles, rises, and burns towards Heaven in a steady flame of ever-brightening purity and faith, then it makes marriage the most perfect union on earth,—the sweetest and most blessed companionship; but when it is a mere gust of fire, bright and fierce as the sudden leaping light of a volcano, then it withers everything at a touch,—faith, honor, truth,—and dies into dull ashes in which no spark remains to warm or inspire man's
