"Well, a holy light, sadness-bearing light, like this now rested on the bodies of the sleeping pair. At first, this silvery radiance filled the room, and then the fleecy vapor began to condense slowly. Presently it formed into a rich and opalescent cloud-column, which speedily changed into a large globe, winged, radiant and beautiful. Gradually there appeared in the centre of this globe a luminous spot, momentarily intensifying its brilliance, until it became like unto a tiny sun, or as the scintillæ of a rare diamond when all the lamps are brightly shining. Slowly, steadily, the change went on in this magic crystal globe, until there appeared within it the diminutive figure of a female, whose outlines became more clear as time passed on, until, at the end of a few minutes, the figure was perfect, and stood fully revealed and complete—about eighteen inches high, and lovely—ah, how lovely!—that figure; it was more than woman is—was all she may become—petite, but absolutely perfect in form, feature and expression; and there was a love-glow radiating from her presence sufficiently melting to subdue the heart of Sin itself, though robed in Nova Zembla's icy shroud. Her eyes!—ah, her eyes!—they were softer than the down upon a ring-dove's breast!—not electric, not magnetic—such are human eyes; and she was not of this earth—they were something more, and higher—they were tearful, anxious, solicitous, hopeful, tender, beaming with that snowy love which blessed immortals feel. Her hair was loose, and hung in flowing waves adown her pearly neck and shoulders. Such a neck and shoulders!—polished alabaster, dashed with orange blossoms, is a very poor comparison; it would be better to say that they resembled petrified light, tinted with the morning blush of roses! Around her brow was a coronet of burnished, rainbow hues; or rather the resplendent tints of polarized light. In its centre was the insignia of the Supreme Temple of the Rosie Cross—a circle inclosing a triangle—a censer on one side, an anchor fouled on the other, the centre-piece being a winged globe, surmounted by the sacred trine, and based by the watchword of the Order, 'Try,' the whole being arched with the blazon, 'Rosicrucia.' To attempt a minute description of this peerless fay, on my part, would be madness:—her chin, her mouth, her bust, her lips! No! I am not so vain as to make the essay. I may be equal to such a task a century or two from this, but am not equal to it now.
"There, then, and thus stood the crowned beauty of the Night, gazing down with looks of pity upon the restless occupants of that humble couch; for during all these transactions they had been asleep. She stood there, the realization and embodiment of Light; and there, directly facing her, glowered, and floated the eye of that hateful, scowling, frowning Thing—scowling with malignant joy upon the woman and the man. Thus stood the Shadow: thus stood the Light. But soon there came a change o'er the spirit of the scene; for now an occurrence took place of a character quite as remarkable as either of those already recounted; for in a very short time after the two Mysteries had assumed their relative positions, there came through the window—the same little window at the foot of the bed—the tall and stately figure of a man—a tall and regal figure, but it was light and airy—buoyant as a summer cloud pillowed on the air—the figure of a man, but not solid, for it was translucent as the pearly dew, radiant as the noontide sun, majestic as a lofty mountain when it wears a snowy crown!—the royal form of a man, but evidently not a ghost, or wraith, or a man of these days, or of this earth, or of the ages now elapsing. He was something more than man; he was supramortal; a bright and glorious citizen of a starry land of glory, whose gates I beheld, once upon a time, when Lara bade me wait; he was of a lineage we Rosicrucians wot of, and only we!—a dweller in a wondrous city, afar off, real, actual—whose gates are as the finest pearl—so bright and beautiful are they.... The stately figure advanced midway of the room until he occupied the centre of a triangle formed by the shadowy Thing, the female figure, and the bed; and then he waved his hand, in which was a staff or truncheon—winged at top and bottom; and he spake, saying:
"'I, Otanethi, the Genius of the Temple, Lord of the Hour, and servant of the Dome, am sent hither to thee, O Hesperina, Preserver of the falling; and to thee, dark Shadow, and to these poor blind gropers in the Night and gloom. I am sent to proclaim that man ever reacheth Ruin or Redemption through himself alone—strengthened by Love of Him—self-sought—reacheth either Pole of Possibility as he, fairly warned, and therefore fully armed, may elect! Poor, weak man!—a giant, knowing not his own tremendous power!—Master both of Circumstance and the World—yet the veriest slave to either!—weak, but only through ignorance of himself!—forever and forever failing in life's great race through slenderness of Purpose!—through feebleness of Will! Virtue is not virtue which comes not of Principle within—that comes not of will and aspiration. That abstinence from wrong is not virtue which results from external pressure—fear of what the speech of people may effect! It is false!—that virtue which requires bolstering or propping up, and falls when left to try its strength alone! Vice is not vice, but weakness, that springs not from within—which is the effect of applied force. Real vice is that which leaves sad marks upon the soul's escutcheon, which the waters of an eternity may not lave away or wash out; and it comes of settled purpose—from within, and is the thing of Will. The virtue that has never known temptation—and withstood it, counts but little in the great Ledger of the Yet to Be! True virtue is good resolve, better thinking, and action best of all! That man is but half completed whom the world has wholly made. They are never truly made who fail to make themselves! Mankind are not of the kingdom of the Shadow, nor of the glorious realm of Light, but are born, move along, and find their highest development in the path which is bounded on either side by those two eternal Diversities—the Light upon this side—the Shadow upon that:
"'The road to man and womanhood lies in the mean:
Discontent on either side—happiness between.'"'Life is a triangle, and it may be composed of Sorrow, Crime, Misery; or Aspiration, Wisdom, Happiness. These, O peerless Hesperina, are the lessons I am sent to teach. Thou art here to save two souls, not from loss, assailings or assoilings from without, but from the things engendered of morbid thought—monstrous things bred in the cellars of the soul—the cesspools of the spirit—crime-caverns where moral newts and toads, unsightly things and hungry, are ever devouring the flowers that spring up in the heart-gardens of man—pretty flowers, wild—but which double and enhance in beauty and aroma from cultivation and care. We are present—I to waken the wills of yonder pair; thou to arouse a healthy purpose and a normal action; and the Shadow is here to drag them to Perdition. Man cannot reach Heaven save by fearlessly breasting the waves of Hell! Listen! Thou mayest not act directly upon the woman or the man, but are at liberty to effect thy purpose through the instrumentality of Dream! And thou,' addressing the Thing, 'thou grim Shadow—Angel of Crime—monstrous offspring of man's begetting—thou who art permitted to exist, art also allowed to flourish and batten on human hearts. I may not prevent thee—dare not openly frustrate thee—for thus it is decreed. Thou must do thy work. Go; thou art free and unfettered. Do thy worst; but I forbid thee to appear as thou really art—before their waking senses, lest thy horrible presence should strike them dumb and blind, or hurl Will and Reason from their thrones. Begone! To thy labor, foul Thing, and do thy work also through the powerful instrumentality of Dream!'
"Thus spoke the genius of the Order and the Hour; and then, turning him toward the couch, he said, yearningly, with tearful mien and outstretched arms: 'Mortals, hear me in thy slumber—let thy souls, but not thy senses, hear and understand. Behold, I touch thee with this magic wand of Rosicrucia, and with it wake thy sleeping wills—thus do I endow thee with the elements, Attention, Aspiration, Persistence—the seeds of Power—of resistless Might, which, will—if such be thy choice, enable thee to realize a moral fortress, capable of defying the combined assaults of all the enginery Circumstance can bring to bear against thee. The citadel is Will. Intrenched within it, thou art safe. But beware of turning thy assaulting power against thyselves. Will, normal, ever produceth Good: Abnormal, it hurls thee to the Bad! Remember! Wake not to the external life, but in thy slumber seize on the word I whisper in thine ears; it is a magic word—a mighty talisman, more potent than the seal of Solomon—more powerful than the Chaldean's wand—but it is potential for ill as for Good. See to it, therefore, that it is wisely used. The word is,
"TRY!" As thou shalt avail thyselves of its power, so be it unto thee. I now leave thee to thy fate, and the fortunes that may befall thee. Two dreams each shalt thou have this night; one of them shall be overruled by thy good, the other by thy evil genius. God help thee! Farewell!' and in another instant, the tall and stately figure passed through the moonlight, out upon the deep bosom of the Night; and he floated, accompanied by the same soft music heard before, away off into the blue empyrean; and he passed through the window—the little window at the foot of the bed, whose upper sash was down.
PART III.
THE MAGIC SPELL.
"In the Kingdom of Dream strange things are seen,
And the Fate of the Nations are there, I ween."
From "The Rosie Cross," an unpublished Poem by P. B. Randolph.
"The regal being was scarcely gone from the chamber ere Hesperina and the Shadow—which had once more become visible, approached the sleeping pair—drew nigh unto the woman and the man; and the Fay gently breathed upon their heads, as if to establish a magnetic rapport between herself and them. She then calmly took her stand near the bedside, and folded her beautiful arms across her still more beautiful bosom, and awaited the action of the tempter. She had not long to wait, for straightway the Black Presence advanced, and hovered over the bed—hovered scowlingly over them, glaring down into their souls, as doth the vampire upon the man she would destroy—the spirit of Wrong peering wistfully at all beautiful things, and true! Such was the posture of affairs; and thus they remained until the Thing had also established some sort of connection with the sleepers. It soon became evident, from their nervous, uneasy movements and postures, that the twain were rapidly crossing the mystic boundaries that divide our own from Dream-land—that they were just entering the misty mid-region—the Shadow, the Thing, the monstrous It, ruling the hour, and guiding them through the strange realm—
"'That lieth sublime, out of Space and out of Time.'
"The man who says that dreams are figments is a fool. Half of our nightly experiences are, in their subsequent effects upon us, far more real and positive than our daily life of wakefulness. Dreams are, as a general thing, save in rare instances, sneered at by the wise ones of this sapient age. Events, we of Rosicrucia hold, are pre-acted in other spheres of being. Prophetic dreaming is no new thing. Circumstances are constantly occurring in the outer life that have been pre-viewed in Dream-land. Recently, while in Constantinople, I became acquainted with a famous Dongolese negro, near the Grand Mosque of St. Sophia, in one of the narrow streets on the left, as you enter the square from toward the first bridge, and this man had reduced the interpretation of dreams to a science almost; and many a long hour have I rapidly driven the pen, in the work of recording what was translated to me from Dongolese and Arabic into Turkish and English, from his lips, obtaining in this way not merely the principles upon which his art was founded, but also explicit interpretations of about twenty-nine hundred different dreams.