“Well, everything can be over-done,” replied his brother,—“even the process of reasoning. We can, if we choose, ‘reason’ ourselves into madness. There is a boundary-line to every science which the human intellect dare not overstep.”
“I wonder what and where is your boundary-line?” questioned Féraz lightly.—“Have you laid one down for yourself at all? Surely not!—for you are too ambitious.”
El-Râmi made no answer to this observation, but betook himself to his books and papers. Féraz meanwhile set the room in order and cleared away the breakfast,—and, these duties done, he quietly withdrew. Left to himself, El-Râmi took from the centre drawer of his writing-table a medium-sized manuscript book which was locked, and which he opened by means of a small key that was attached to his watch-chain, and bending over the title-page he critically examined it. Its heading ran thus—
The New Religion
A Reasonable Theory of Worship conformable to the Eternal and Unalterable Laws of Nature.
“The title does not cover all the ground,” he murmured as he read.—“And yet how am I to designate it? It is a vast subject, and presents different branches of treatment, and, after all said and done, I may have wasted my time in planning it. Most likely I have,—but there is no scientist living who would refuse to accept it. The question is, shall I ever finish it?—shall I ever know positively that there IS, without doubt, a conscious, personal Something or Some one after death who enters at once upon another existence? My new experiment will decide all—if I see the Soul of Lilith, all hesitation will be at an end—I shall be sure of everything which now seems uncertain. And then the triumph!—then the victory!”
His eyes sparkled, and, dipping his pen in the ink, he prepared to write, but ere he did so the message which the monk had left for him to read recurred with a chill warning to his memory,—
“Beware the end! With Lilith’s love comes Lilith’s freedom.”
He considered the words for a moment apprehensively,—and then a proud smile played round his mouth.
“For a Master who has attained to some degree of wisdom, his intuition is strangely erroneous this time,” he muttered. “For if there be any dream of love in Lilith, that dream, that love is mine! And being mine, who shall dispute possession,—who shall take her from me? No one,—not even God,—for He does not break through the laws of Nature. And by those laws I have kept Lilith—and even so I will keep her still.”