Reverently brushing back more of the tangle, and carefully removing the velvety covering, they beheld another inscription,—
“GOD IS ETERNAL LOVE AND LIFE.”
Saulus was lifted to the supremacy and sublimity of a new, triumphant faith. He felt the sweet certainty of something nobler and purer than he had ever conceived; a gladness that nestled in his heart, making it warm and tranquil. He had no favor to ask or petition to make of the Divinity which embraced him, for his soul was filled—satisfied. There was no lack. Enswathed in the Eternal Presence, he could crave no more.
Every branch and twig and leaf seemed to be tipped with a lambent, gleaming light which shone upon him. The whole Vision smiled, and the Voice gave him a wel[pg 278]come, until with bated breath and throbbing heart he had a sense of leaving the body, and rising and being encircled by a golden aureole.
With eyes upturned, the bodily form of Saulus sank quietly back until he lay stretched upon the soft, mossy couch beneath him. The seen world faded out amidst the uprearing of a transcendent ecstasy.
* * * * * * * * * *
Amoz sat by his side, wondering at the experiences of the great soul which he had seen so variously possessed. A smile played upon the upturned face of Saulus as he lay, calm and unconscious, in the cooling shade. Was there a prophetic gleam of future power and glory? Was there some dim foretaste of an Apostolic energy, which should reach, not merely one race, but possess a moulding influence upon the world? Had he been carried up in a Chariot of Fire to an altitude where he could look out over the Future, and rapturously behold the activity of unseen forces and intelligences, through whose final triumph the kingdom of universal love and harmony—that at-one-ment of the Divine and Human—is to be ushered in?
* * * * * * * * * *
At length Saulus opened his eyes and sat upright. He said nothing of the Vision, for it was unspeakable.
Hand in hand Saulus and Amoz stood up and drew nearer to the great rocky Breast, which reached almost perpendicularly far up beyond the range of their vision. Again they essayed to decipher and interpret the mys[pg 279]terious signs and symbols which were clustered about the plain sentences already read, but in vain.