upon the world. Happy voices, ringing in
the sensuous arcades of music, fall on my ears, the blown spray of
immortal friendships.

"Yet, is it not strange that all these delights, violent and glorious
as they are, do not wholly satisfy the soul? I continually long for
something sweeter yet. It seems the greater the joy the more enormous
the capacity, and no joy completely fills the ever-expanding soul."

"You think," said I, "that even the rapture of a goddess is not wholly
adequate to create a feeling of repletion of satisfaction in a soul
such as yours?"

"It is contrary to our laws to think so, yet at times I know I could
forego even the throne of the gods itself for the pure and intimate
love of a counterpart soul."

"You are not so desirous of the human soul in its collective form as
you are of individual soul wholly yours?" I ventured, shaken with a
quivering thrill.

"The soul ever seeks that which is beyond and individual," said Lyone;
"having once loved the individual soul, I know what such holy rapture
means."

"What are the difficulties to be surmounted in your quest of a
counterpart soul?" I inquired, with a secret delight.

"The sacrilege of a goddess becoming attached to the individual to the
exclusion of all other individuals. The goddess-elect must have been
a novitiate and priestess of Egyplosis and the survivor of her
counterpart soul. Her experiences as a noble and pure priestess,
together with special beauty and popularity, are the conditions for
the peerless office of supreme goddess and incarnation of Harikar. By
her vows she can never again become the exclusive possession of any
one soul. She belongs to Harikar, the universal soul."

"And what is the punishment for renunciation of your office and
attachment to another soul?"

"A shameful death by magnicity for the twin-soul. No goddess can
resign her office. No goddess can seek a lover and live."

"Not even an ideal affinity?" I asked.

"Why, even ideal affinities who forget themselves are punished with
lifelong imprisonment, and their names blotted out of the priesthood
as though they were dead," said Lyone.

"Are there many such transgressors of their vows in Egyplosis?" I
inquired.

"There are, I believe, some five hundred twin-souls at present immured
in the dungeons," said Lyone.

"Poor souls!" I murmured, "their apostasy was but their reformation."

"I often think of them," said Lyone, "but I know I can never liberate
th