answer to himself_,
or perhaps to a divine principle within himself, that out of his own
free-will, through long aeons and by a million steps, he climbs or sinks
to the heights or depths dormant in his nature; that from what he was,
springs what he is, and what he is, engenders what he shall be for ever
and aye.

Now I envisaged Immortality and splendid and awful was its face. It
clasped me to its breast and in the vast circle of its arms I was
up-borne, I who knew myself to be without beginning and without end,
and yet of the past and of the future knew nothing, save that these were
full of mysteries.

As I went I encountered others, or overtook them, making the same
journey. Robertson swept past me, and spoke, but in a tongue I could
not understand. I noted that the madness had left his eyes and that his
fine-cut features were calm and spiritual. The other wanderers I did not
know.

I came to a region of blinding light; the thought rose in me that I
must have reached the sun, or a sun, though I felt no heat. I stood in a
lovely, shining valley about which burned mountains of fire. There were
huge trees in that valley, but they glowed like gold and their flowers
and fruit were as though they had been fashioned of many-coloured
flames.

The place was glorious beyond compare, but very strange to me and not
to be described. I sat me down upon a boulder which burned like a ruby,
whether with heat or colour I do not know, by the edge of a stream that
flowed with what looked like fire and made a lovely music. I stooped
down and drank of this water of flames and the scent and the taste of it
were as those of the costliest wine.

There, beneath the spreading limbs of a fire-tree I sat, and examined
the strange flowers that grew around, coloured like rich jewels and
perfumed above imagining. There were birds also which might have been
feathered with sapphires, rubies and amethysts, and their song was so
sweet that I could have wept to hear it. The scene was wonderful
and filled me with exaltation, for I thought of the land where it is
promised that there shall be no more night.

People began to appear; men, women, and even children, though whence
they came I could not see. They did not fly and they did not walk; they
seemed to drift towards me, as unguided boats drift upon the tide.
One and all they were very beautiful, but their beauty was not human
although their shapes and faces resembled those of men and women