"It must be so. This is a history of man on Earth, the continuation will be a history of man within the Unknown Country."
"And I am not to receive the remainder of your story?" I reiterated, still loth to give it up.
"No; I shall not appear directly to you again. Your part in this work will have ended when, after thirty years, you carry out the directions given in the sealed letter which, with this manuscript, I entrust to your care. I must return now to the shore that separated me from my former guide, and having again laid down this semblance of a body, go once more into"—
He buried his face in his hands and sobbed. Yes; this strange, cynical being whom I had at first considered an impertinent fanatic, and then, more than once afterward, had been induced to view as a cunning impostor, or to fear as a cold, semi-mortal, sobbed like a child.
"It is too much," he said, seemingly speaking to himself; "too much to require of one not yet immortal, for the good of his race. I am again with men, nearly a human, and I long to go back once more to my old home, my wife, my children. Why am I forbidden? The sweets of Paradise can not comfort the mortal who must give up his home and family, and yet carry his earth-thought beyond. Man can not possess unalloyed joys, and blessings spiritual, and retain one backward longing for mundane subjects, and I now yearn again for my earth love, my material family. Having tasted of semi-celestial pleasures in one of the mansions of that complacent, pure, and restful sphere, I now exist in the border land, but my earth home is not relinquished, I cling as a mortal to former scenes, and crave to meet my lost loved ones. All of earth must be left behind if Paradise is ever wholly gained, yet I have still my sublunary thoughts.
"Etidorhpa! Etidorhpa!" he pleaded, turning his eyes as if towards one I could not see, "Etidorhpa, my old home calls. Thou knowest that the beginning of man on earth is a cry born of love, and the end of man on earth is a cry for love; love is a gift of Etidorhpa, and thou, Etidorhpa, the soul of love, should have compassion on a pleading mortal."
He raised his hands in supplication.
"Have mercy on me, Etidorhpa, as I would on you if you were I and I were Etidorhpa."
Then with upturned face he stood long and silent, listening.
"Ah," he murmured at last, as if in reply to a voice I could not catch, a voice that carried to his ear an answer of deep disappointment; "thou spokest truly in the vision, Etidorhpa: it is love that enslaves mankind; love that commands; love that ensnares and rules mankind, and thou, Etidorhpa, art the soul of Love. True it is that were there no Etidorhpa, there would still be tears on earth, but the cold, meaningless tears of pain only. No mourning people, no sorrowful partings, no sobbing mothers kneeling with upturned faces, no planting of the myrtle and the rose on sacred graves. There would be no child-love, no home, no tomb, no sorrow, no Beyond"—