that passed over my thought. "Must I return
again to life?" I said.

"Oh yes," said the other; "you see that; you will soon return
again--but never mind that now; you are here to drink your fill of the
beautiful things which you will only remember by glimpses and visions
when you are back in the little life again."

And then I had a sudden intuition. I seemed to be suddenly in a small
and ugly street of a dark town. I saw slatternly women run in and out
of the houses; I saw smoke-stained grimy children playing in the
gutter. Above the poor, ill-kept houses a factory poured its black
smoke into the air, and hummed behind its shuttered windows. I knew in
a sad flash of thought that I was to be born there, to be brought up as
a wailing child, under sad and sordid conditions, to struggle into a
life of hard and hopeless labour, in the midst of vice, and poverty,
and drunkenness, and hard usage. It filled me for a moment with a sort
of nauseous dread, remembering the free and liberal conditions of my
last life, the wealth and comfort I had enjoyed.

"No," said the other; for in a moment I was back again, "that is an
unworthy thought--it is but for a moment; and you will return to this
peace again."

But the sad thought came down upon me like a cloud. "Is there no
escape?" I said; and at that, in a moment, the other spirit seemed to
chide me, not angrily, but patiently and compassionately. "One
suffers," he said, "but one gains experience; one rises," adding more
gently: "We do not know why it must be, of course--but it is the Will;
and however much one may doubt and suffer in the dark world there, one
does not doubt of the wisdom or the love of it here." And I knew in a
moment that I did not doubt, but that I would go willingly wherever I
should be sent.

And then my thought became concerned with the spirit that spoke with
me, and I said, "And what is your place and work? for I think you are
like me and yet unlike." And he said: "Yes, it is true; I have to
return thither no more; that is finished for me, and I grudge no single
step of the dark road: I cannot explain to you what my work or place
is; but I am old, and have seen many things; each of us has to return
and return, not indeed till we are made perfect, but till we have
finished that part of our course; but the blessedness of this peace
grows and grows, while it becomes easier to bear what happens in that
other place, for we grow strong and simple and