if we attempted only what our neighbors or our fathers had succeeded in doing, we should kill all chance of variety or improvement.  It would be a stupidly wise world; there would be no sins, and, very possibly, no virtues; instead of “Everything happens,” it would be “Nothing happens.”  Believing and hoping, therefore, that Dr. Potter’s calamities will not be the smallest check upon any person who shall feel disposed to follow in his footsteps, I present the story to the public, not at all as a lesson, but merely as an item of curious information.

Oddly enough, it was on that day of delusions, the first of April, that I stumbled into the Doctor’s revival of the age of miracles.  I had been engaged for three months on a geological survey in a Western Territory, during which time I had received very brief and vague news from the little city which was then my place of abode, and had not even had a hint of the signs and wonders which there awaited my astonished observation.  Reaching home, I made it my first business to call on my reverend friend; for the Doctor, it must be known, was one of my most valued intimates, had baptized me, had counselled me, had travelled with me in foreign lands; we had many interests, many sympathies in common, and no differences except with regard to the extent of the Flood, the date of the Creation, and other matters of small personal importance.  I found him in his study, surrounded by those seven hundred and odd volumes, the learning and excellent spirit of which gave to his sermons such a body of venerable divinity, such a bouquet of savory eloquence.  He was walking to and fro rapidly, studying a slip of manuscript with an air of serious ecstasy.  He did not look up until I had seized his hand, and even then he stared at me as a man might be supposed to stare who had been passing a fortnight with angels or other spiritual existences and unexpectedly found himself among natural and reasonable beings again.

“Ah, my dear Elderkin,” he said at last, “I am glad to see you.  How are you, and how have you been?  Excuse me for not recognizing you at once.  I had just lost myself in the consideration of a mystery which I believe to be of the sublimest importance.  Oh, my dear friend, I hope you will be brought to attend to these things!  They are above and beyond all your geologies; they preceded and will outlive them.”

“Indeed!” I replied.  “Nothing in the way of chaos, I hope?”

“Look here at this sheet of foolscap,” he exclaimed, waving it excitedly.  “Do you remember the belief which I have often expressed to you,—­the belief that the dispensation of miracles has never yet ceased from earth,—­that we have still a right to expect signs, wonders, instantaneous healings, and unknown tongues,—­and that, but for our wretched incredulity, these things would constantly happen among us?  You have disputed it and ridiculed it, but here I hold a proof of its truth.  A month ago this blessing was vouchsafed