to the scope and depth of her views.  They come,—­myself among the number,—­I confess,—­to be entertained; but she has a higher purpose.  She, amid all her infirmities, studies and thinks with the seriousness of one upon oath, and there has not been a single conversation this winter, in either class, that had not in it the spirit which giveth life.  Just in proportion to the importance of the subject, does she tax her mind, and say what is most important; while, of necessity, nothing is reported from the conversations but her brilliant sallies, her occasional paradoxes of form, and, sometimes, her impatient reacting upon dulness and frivolity.  In particular points, I know, some excel her; in particular departments I sympathize more with some other persons; but, take her as a whole, she has the most to bestow on others by conversation of any person I have ever known.  I cannot conceive of any species of vanity living in her presence.  She distances all who talk with her.

“Mr. E. only served to display her powers.  With his sturdy reiteration of his uncompromising idealism, his absolute denial of the fact of human nature, he gave her opportunity and excitement to unfold and illustrate her realism and acceptance of conditions.  What is so noble is, that her realism is transparent with idea,—­her human nature is the germ of a divine life.  She proceeds in her search after the unity of things, the divine harmony, not by exclusion, as Mr. E. does, but by comprehension,—­and so, no poorest, saddest spirit, but she will lead to hope and faith.  I have thought, sometimes, that her acceptance of evil was too great,—­that her theory of the good to be educed proved too much.  But in a conversation I had with her yesterday, I understood her better than I had done.  ‘It might never be sin to us, at the moment,’ she said, ’it must be an excess, on which conscience puts the restraint.’”

The classes thus formed were renewed in November of each year, until Margaret’s removal to New York, in 1844.  But the notes of my principal reporter fail me at this point.  Afterwards, I have only a few sketches from a younger hand.  In November, 1841, the class numbered from twenty-five to thirty members:  the general subject is stated as “Ethics.”  And the influences on Woman seem to have been discussed under the topics of the Family, the School, the Church, Society, and Literature.  In November, 1842, Margaret writes that the meetings have been unusually spirited, and congratulates herself on the part taken in them by Miss Burley, as ’a presence so positive as to be of great value to me.’  The general subject I do not find.  But particular topics were such as these:—­“Is the ideal first or last; divination or experience?” “Persons who never awake to life in this world.”  “Mistakes;” “Faith;” “Creeds;” “Woman;” “Daemonology;” “Influence;” “Catholicism” (Roman); “The Ideal.”

In the winter of 1843-4, the general subject was “Education.”  Culture, Ignorance, Vanity, Prudence, Patience, and Health, appear to have been the titles of conversations, in which wide digressions, and much autobiographic illustration, with episodes on War, Bonaparte, Goethe, and Spinoza, were mingled.  But the brief narrative may wind up with a note from Margaret on the last day.