The light would have killed one who had not integrated spiritual light to reflect it.  The light of the Illuminati is terrible to eyes filled with evil.  This was the “smile of the Universe” that Dante saw....  He, Andrew Bedient, loved infinitely and was infinitely loved.  The words of a hundred saints echoed in his consciousness—­and out of them all came this command: 

Make men to know that this which has come to you, will come to them.  The few have gone before you, but the many have not ascended so far.

And now he saw the whole road of man, from the simple consciousness of animals, through human self-consciousness, to the cosmic consciousness of prophets—­and beyond to Divinity.  Always the refinement of matter, and the attraction of light—­spiritual light.  He saw the time when a self-conscious man was the best specimen of the human race.  So for cosmic consciousness, the time would come; and as the centuries passed, the earlier would it appear in the life of the evolved.

A clear expression of what had taken place within him now appeared—­his own expression to make it clear for men.  In the summit of self-consciousness, his mind was like a campfire in the night—­a few objects in a circle of red firelight and shadow.  The crown of cosmic consciousness now come, was the dawn of full day upon the plain.

Full day upon the plain—­distances, contours, the great blooms of space; a swarm of bees, a constellation of suns; the traffic of ants among the dropped twigs of the sand, the communion of angels beyond the veils of heaven; the budding of a primrose, the resurrection of a God—­and all for men, when the daybreak and the shadows flee away.

He saw that this was the natal hour of the world’s soul-life, and that it would come through the giving spirit of Woman.  He saw great souls pressing close to every pure, strong, feminine spirit; the first fruits of the centuries hovering close to great women of the world, praying for bodies to toil with, eager to turn from their heaven to labor for men....  And this was the shekinah of Andrew Bedient—­the spirit of his message.

* * * * *

His blood ceased to flow; he heard the flight of angels; he was bathed in Brahmic splendor—­until he could bear no more....

He awoke in the “ambrosia of dawn”; in that strange hush which lies upon the world before fall the floods of rosy red....  He arose, his feet stumbling with ecstasy.  Light winged over the hills—­and afar off, he saw the roofs of the hacienda sharpen with day....

His face was like morning upon a cloud.  The natives vanished before him; Falk and Leadley shrank back, wondering what manner of drink he had found in the night.

THIRTY-FIFTH CHAPTER

FATE KNOCKS AT THE DOOR