CHAPTER VI.
THE TRAVELLER AND THE TEMPLE OF KNOWLEDGE.
COUNTLESS ages ago a Traveller, much worn with journeying, climbed up the last bit of rough road which led to the summit of a high mountain. There was a temple on that mountain. And the Traveller had vowed that he would reach it before death prevented him. He knew the journey was long, and the road rough. He knew that the mountain was the most difficult of ascent of that mountain chain, called "The Ideals." But he had a strongly-hoping heart and a sure foot. He lost all sense of time, but he never lost the feeling of hope.
"Even if I faint by the way-side," he said to himself, "and am not able to reach the summit, still it is something to be on the road which leads to the High Ideals."
That was how he comforted himself when he was weary. He never lost more hope than that; and surely that was little enough.
And now he had reached the temple.
He rang the bell, and an old white-haired man opened the gate. He smiled sadly when he saw the Traveller.
"And yet another one," he murmured. "What does it all mean?"
The Traveller did not hear what he murmured.
"Old white-haired man," he said, "tell me; and so I have come at last to the wonderful Temple of Knowledge. I have been journeying hither all my life. Ah, but it is hard work climbing up to the Ideals."