an instant like a cloud of smoke, and then faded into
the sky.

"What is that?" I said, surprised out of my terror.

"I may tell you that," said Amroth, "that you may know what you see.
There is no time here; and you have seen a universe made, and live its
life, and die. You have seen the worlds created. That cloud of whirling
suns, each with its planets, has taken shape before your eyes; life has
arisen there, has developed; men like ourselves have lived, have
wrestled with evil, have formed states, have died and vanished. That is
all but a single thought of God."

Another came, and then another of the golden jets, each fading into
darkness and dispersing.

"And now," said Amroth, "the moment has come. You are to make the last
sacrifice of the soul. Do not shrink back, fear nothing. Leap into the
abyss!"

The thought fell upon me with an infinity and an incredulity of horror
that I cannot express in words. I covered my eyes with my hands.

"Oh, I cannot, I cannot," I said; "anything but this! God be merciful;
let me go rather to some infinite place of torment where at least I may
feel myself alive. Do not ask this of me!"

Amroth made no answer, and I saw that he was regarding me fixedly,
himself pale to the lips; but with a touch of anger and even of
contempt, mixed with a world of compassion and love. There was something
in this look which seemed to entreat me mutely for my own sake and his
own to act. I do not know what the impulse was that came to
me--self-contempt, trust, curiosity, the yearning of love. I closed my
eyes, I took a faltering step, and stumbled, huddling and aghast, over
the edge. The air flew up past me with a sort of shriek; I opened my
eyes once, and saw the white cliffs speeding past. Then an
unconsciousness came over me and I knew no more.

XXXIII

I came to myself very gradually and dimly, with no recollection at first
of what had happened. I was lying on my back on some soft grassy place,
with the air blowing cool over me. I thought I saw Amroth bending over
me with a look of extraordinary happiness, and felt his arm about me;
but again I became unconscious, yet all the time with a blissfulness of
repose and joy, far beyond what I had experienced at my first waking on
the sunlit sea. Again life dawned upon me. I was there, I was myself.
What had happened to me? I could not tell. So I lay for a long time half
dreaming and half swooning; till at last life seemed to come back