valley.”  Elisha peremptorily refused to grant them leave.  They were importunate; and when, at last, it would, perhaps, seem like obstinacy in him, or like jealousy of their superior love for Elijah, to forbid the search, which at the worst would only be fruitless, he yielded.  Three days they explored the valleys, ransacked the thickets, groped in the caves, traversed hills, followed imaginary trails and footprints, but found him not.  When they came again to Elisha, “he said unto them, Did I not say unto you, Go not?”

We cannot become accustomed at once, nor for a long time, to the absence of our friend.  If his death was sudden, or if it took place away from home, or during our absence, we expect to see him again; if a vehicle stops at the door, the heart beats with an instantaneous hope which dies with its first breath, bringing over us a deeper and stronger refluence of sorrow.  We catch a sight of articles familiarly used by a departed friend; they are identified with little passages in his history, or with his daily life:  is it possible that he is altogether and forever disconnected from them?  They are the same; those perishable things, those comparatively worthless things, having no value at all except as his use of them made them precious, retain their shapes and places; but where is he? and must not he return and abide, like them?

No, he is gone to heaven.  The places which knew him shall know him no more forever.  Those things, which have an imperishable value in being associated with his memory, are, to him, like the leaves of a past autumn to a tree now filled with blossoms.  The mention of every valued possession once indescribably dear to him, would awaken but slight emotions; even the recent history of the dwelling which he built and furnished, would be no more to him than the rehearsal to a grown person of that which had happened to a block house, or card figure, which amused his childhood.  We walk and sit in the places identified with our last remembrances of the departed; but he is not there; we hallow the anniversaries of his birth and death; but he gives us no recognition; we read his letters; they make him seem alive; his voice, his smile, his love are there; and when we have finished, nature, exhausted with its weeping, sighs, “And where is he?”

He is gone to heaven.  Even the earthly house of his tabernacle is dissolved; that part of him which was all of which we were cognizant by our senses, is no more.  We could not recognize it; to the earth, out of which it was taken, it has, by slow degrees, returned,—­as though every thing earthly, belonging to him, ’must needs die, and be as water spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again.’  We travel to his birthplace; there is the house where he was born; we meet those who grew with him side by side; we are among the scenes which were most familiar to him; he planted those trees; he collected those pictures; there is his portrait, he rested here, he studied, he worked, he rejoiced, he wept, in these consecrated places; but did we go thinking to find him there?  “Did I not say unto you, Go not?”