Then turning he ran, literally ran, where to I am sure I do not know, probably to seek the fellowship of some other policeman.  In due course I followed, and, lifting the bar at the end of the hall, departed without further question asked.  Afterwards I was very glad to think that I had done the man no injury.  At the moment I knew that I could hurt him if I would, and what is more I had the desire to do so.  It came to me, I suppose, with that breath of the past when I was so great and absolute.  Perhaps I, or that part of me then incarnate, was a tyrant in those days, and this is why now I must be so humble.  Fate is turning my pride to its hammer and beating it out of me.

For thus in the long history of the soul it serves all our vices.

THE GREAT WHITE ROAD

Now, as I have hinted, under the teaching of Jorsen, who saved me from degradation and self-murder, yes, and helped me with money until once again I could earn a livelihood, I have acquired certain knowledge and wisdom of a sort that are not common.  That is, Jorsen taught me the elements of these things; he set my feet upon the path which thenceforward, having the sight, I have been able to follow for myself.  How I followed it does not matter, nor could I teach others if I would.

I am no member of any mystic brotherhood, and, as I have explained, no Mahatma, although I have called myself thus for present purposes because the name is a convenient cloak.  I repeat that I am ignorant if there are such people as Mahatmas, though if so I think Jorsen must be one of them.  Still he never told me this.  What he has told is that every individual spirit must work out its own destiny quite independently of others.  Indeed, being rather fond of fine phrases, he has sometimes spoken to me of, or rather, insisted upon what he called “the lonesome splendour of the human soul,” which it is our business to perfect through various lives till I can scarcely appreciate and am certainly unable to describe.

To tell the truth, the thought of this “lonesome splendour” to which it seems some of us may attain, alarms me.  I have had enough of being lonesome, and I do not ask for any particular splendour.  My only ambitions are to find those whom I have lost, and in whatever life I live to be of use to others.  However, as I gather that the exalted condition to which Jorsen alludes is thousands of ages off for any of us, and may after all mean something quite different to what it seems to mean, the thought of it does not trouble me over much.  Meanwhile what I seek is the vision of those I love.