From stars and fire-mist he came now into humanity, using the limited instrument of a human mechanism, a mechanism he must learn to master without breaking it. A human brain and nerves confined him. He could deal with essences only, those essential, buried, semi-elemental powers that lie ever waiting below the threshold of all human consciousness, linking men, did they but know it, direct with the sea of universal life which is inexhaustible, independent of space and time. The fraction of his nature which had manifested as a transient surface-personality—LeVallon—was gone for ever, merged in the real self below.
His origin was already forgotten; no memory of it lay in his present brain; he must suffer training, education, and he turned instinctively to those whose ideal, like his own, was one of impersonal service. To a woman he turned, and to a man. His recognition, guided by Nature, was sure and accurate. It must take time and patience, sympathy and love, faith, belief and trust, and the labour must be borne by one man chiefly—by Fillery, into whose life had come this strange bright messenger carrying glad tidings ... to prove at last that man was greater than he knew, that the hope for Humanity, for the deteriorating Race, for crumbling Civilization, lay in drawing out into full practical consciousness the divine powers concealed below the threshold of every single man and woman....
But how, in what practical manner, what instrument could they use? The human mechanism, the brain, the mind, afforded inadequate means of manifestation; new wines into old skins meant disaster; knowledge, power beyond the experience of the Race needed a better instrument than the one the Race had painfully evolved for present uses. New powers of unknown kinds, as already in those rare cases when the supernormal forces emerged, could only strain the machinery and cause disorder. A new order of consciousness required another, a different equipment. And the idea flashed into him, as in the Studio when he watched "N. H." and the girl—Father Collins had divined its possibility as well—the idea of a group consciousness, a collective group-soul. What a single individual might not be able to resist at first without disaster, many—a group in harmony—two or three gathered together in unison—these might provide the way, the means, the instrument—the body.
"The personal merged in the impersonal," he exclaimed to the night about him, already aware that words, expression, failed even at this early stage of understanding. "Beauty, Art! Where words, form, colour end, we shall construct, while yet using these as far as they go, a new vehicle, a new——"
"Good evenin'," said a gruff voice. "Good evenin', sir," it added more respectfully, after a second's inspection. "Turned out quite fine after the storm."
Aware of the policeman suddenly, Fillery started and turned round abruptly. Evidently he had uttered his thoughts aloud, probably had cried and shouted them. He could think of nothing in the world to say.
"It was a terrible storm. I hardly ever see the likes of it." The man was looking at him still with doubtful curiosity.
"Extraordinary, yes." Dr. Fillery managed to find a few natural words. It was an early hour in the morning to be out, and his position by the pond, he now realized, might have suggested an undesirable intention. "It made sleep impossible, and I came out to—to take a walk. I'm a doctor, Dr. Fillery—the Fillery Home."
"Yes, sir," said the man, apparently satisfied. He looked at the sky. "All blown away again," he remarked, "and the moon that nice and bright——"
Fillery offered something in reply, then moved away. The moon, he noticed, was indeed nice and bright now; the heavy lower vapours all had vanished, and thin cirrus clouds at a great height moved slowly before an upper wind; the stars shone clearly, and a faint line of colour gave a hint of dawn not far away.