man, with a
vigorous brain. Soar and look forth!"

As he spoke I felt as if I rose out of myself upon eagle wings. All the
weight seemed gone from air--roofless the room, roofless the dome of
space. I was not in the body--where I knew not--but aloft over time,
over earth.

Again I heard the melodious whisper,--"You say right. I have mastered
great secrets by the power of Will; true, by Will and by Science I can
retard the process of years: but death comes not by age alone. Can I
frustrate the accidents which bring death upon the young?"

"No; every accident is a providence. Before a providence snaps every
human will."

"Shall I die at last, ages and ages hence, by the slow, though
inevitable, growth of time, or by the cause that I call accident?"

"By a cause you call accident."

"Is not the end still remote?" asked the whisper, with a slight tremor.

"Regarded as my life regards time, it is still remote."

"And shall I, before then, mix with the world of men as I did ere I
learned these secrets, resume eager interest in their strife and their
trouble--battle with ambition, and use the power of the sage to win the
power that belongs to kings?"

"You will yet play a part on the earth that will fill earth with
commotion and amaze. For wondrous designs have you, a wonder yourself,
been permitted to live on through the centuries. All the secrets you
have stored will then have their uses--all that now makes you a stranger
amidst the generations will contribute then to make you their lord. As
the trees and the straws are drawn into a whirlpool--as they spin round,
are sucked to the deep, and again tossed aloft by the eddies, so shall
races and thrones be plucked into the charm of your vortex. Awful
Destroyer--but in destroying, made, against your own will, a
Constructor!"

"And that date, too, is far off?"

"Far off; when it comes, think your end in this world is at hand!"

"How and what is the end? Look east, west, south, and north."

"In the north, where you never yet trod towards the point whence your
instincts have warned you, there a spectre will seize you. 'Tis Death! I
see a ship--it is haunted--'tis chased--it sails on. Baffled navies sail
after that ship. It enters the region of ice. It passes a sky red with
meteors. Two moons stand on high, over ice-reefs. I see the ship locked
between white defiles--they are ice-rocks. I see the dead strew the
decks--stark and livid, green mould on their limbs. All