clay—­the men and women who pretend to love while they secretly hate and despise one another.  There, wealth is a god, and the greed of gain a virtue.  There, genius starves, and heroism dies unrewarded.  There, faith is martyred, and unbelief elected sovereign monarch of the people.  There, the sublime, unreachable mysteries of the Universe are haggled over by poor finite minds who cannot call their lives their own.  There, nation wars against nation, creed against creed, soul against soul.  Alas, fated planet! how soon shalt thou be extinct, and thy place shall know thee no more!”

I gazed earnestly at my radiant guide.  “If that is true,” I said, “why then should we have a legend that God, in the person of one called Christ, came to die for so miserable and mean a race of beings?”

Azul answered not, but turned her luminous eyes upon me with a sort of wide dazzling wonder.  Some strange impelling force bore me onward, and before I could realize it I was alone.  Alone, in a vast area of light through which I floated, serene and conscious of power.  A sound falling from a great height reached me; it was first like a grand organ-chord, and then like a voice, trumpet-clear and far-echoing.

“Spirit that searchest for the Unseen,” it said, “because I will not that no atom of true worth should perish, unto thee shall be given a vision—­unto thee shall be taught a lesson thou dreamest not of.  Thou shalt create; thou shalt design and plan; thou shalt be worshipped, and thou shalt destroy!  Rest therefore in the light and behold the things that are in the light, for the tune cometh when all that seemeth clear and visible now shall be but darkness.  And they that love me not shall have no place of abode in that hour!”

The voice ceased.  Awed, yet consoled, I listened for it again.  There was no more sound.  Around me was illimitable light—­illimitable silence.  But a strange scene unfolded itself swiftly before me—­a sort of shifting dream that was a reality, yet so wonderfully unreal—­a vision that impressed itself on every portion of my intelligence; a kind of spirit-drama in which I was forced to enact the chief part, and where a mystery that I had deemed impenetrable was made perfectly clear and simple of comprehension.

CHAPTER XI.

A miniature creation.

In my heaven-uplifted dream, I thought I saw a circular spacious garden in which all the lovely landscapes of a superior world appeared to form themselves by swift degrees.  The longer I looked at it, the more beautiful it became, and a little star shone above it like a sun.  Trees and flowers sprang up under my gaze, and all stretched themselves towards me, as though for protection.  Birds flew about and sang; some of them tried to get as near as possible to the little sun they saw; and other living creatures began to move about in the shadows of the groves, and on the fresh green grass.  All the wonderful workings of Nature, as known to us in the world, took place over again in this garden, which seemed somehow to belong to me; and I watched everything with a certain satisfaction and delight.  Then the idea came to me that the place would be fairer if there were either men or angels to inhabit it; and quick as light a whisper came to me: