enty thousand millions. Look, yonder
shines the destined Star; now come! So, it is reached. Nay, do not stop
to stare. Look again! out through utter space to where the low light
glows. So, come once more. The suns float past like windblown golden
dust--like the countless lamps of boats upon the bosom of a summer sea.
There, beneath, lies the very home of Power. Those springing sparks of
light? They are the ineffable Decrees passing outward through infinity.
That sound? It is the voice of worlds which worship.

Look now! Out yonder see the flaming gases gather and cohere. They burn
out and the great globe blackens. Cool mists wrap it, rains fall,
seas collect, continents arise. There is life, behold it, various and
infinite. And hearken to the whisper of this great universe, one tiny
note in that song of praise you heard but now. Yes, the life dies, the
ball grows black again; it is the carcase of a world. How long have
you watched it? For an hour, a breath; but, as you judge time, some
ten thousand million years. Sleep now, you are weary; later you shall
understand.

Thus the wraith of Stella spoke to his soul in visions. Presently,
with drumming ears and eyes before which strange lights seemed to play,
Morris staggered from the place, so weak, indeed, that he could scarcely
thrust one foot before the other. Yet his heart was filled with a mad
joy, and his brain was drunken with the deep cup of a delight and a
knowledge that have seldom been given to man.

On other nights the visions were different. Thus he saw the spirits of
men going out and returning, and among them his own slumbering spirit
that a vast and shadowy Stella bore in her arms as a mother bears a
babe.

He saw also the Vision of Numbers. All the infinite inhabitants of all
the infinite worlds passed before him, marching through the ages to
some end unknown. Once, too, his mind was opened, and he understood
the explanation of Evil and the Reason of Things. He shouted at their
glorious simplicity--shouted for joy; but lo! before he rose from his
chair they were forgotten.

Other visions there were without count. Also they would mix and fall
into new patterns, like the bits of glass in a kaleidoscope. There was
no end to them, and each was lovelier, or grander, or fraught with a
more sweet entrancement, than the last. And still she who brought them,
she who opened his eyes, who caused his ears to hear and his soul to
see; she whom he worshipped; his he