There is here a rare landscape, a valuable picture, which it would be sheer vandalism to allow to perish.
And then, I admire the old monks! I wish to offer up to their departed shades this homage of my sympathy.

Yes, had I lived some thousand years ago, I would certainly have sought among them the repose of the cloister while waiting for the peace of heaven.

What existence could have suited me better?
Free from the cares of this world, and assured of the other, free from any agitations of the heart or the mind, I would have placidly written simple legends which I would have been credulous enough to believe; I would have unraveled with intense curiosity some unknown manuscripts, and discovered with tears of joy the Iliad or the AEneid; I would have sketched imaginary cathedrals; I would have heated alembics--and perhaps have invented gunpowder; which is by no means the best thing I might have done.
Come! 'tis midnight; brother, we must sleep! _Postscriptum._--There are ghosts! I was closing this letter, my dear friend, in the midst of a solemn silence, when suddenly my ears were filled with mysterious and confused sounds that seemed to come from the outside, and among which I thought I could distinguish the buzzing murmur of a large crowd.

I approached, quite surprised, the window of my cell, and I could not exactly tell you the nature of the emotion I felt on discovering the ruins of the church illuminated with a resplendent blaze; the vast portal and the yawning ogives cast floods of light far as the distant woods.

It was not, it could not be, an accidental conflagration.
Besides, I could see, through the stone trefoils, shadows of superhuman size flitting through the nave, apparently performing, with a sort of rhythm, some mysterious ceremony.