proves--always supposing he really does
these things instead of merely appearing to do so--it proves that he is
better acquainted with natural laws than I am. What if he could kill me
by an effort of the will? What if he could bring me to life again? It is
always the same; he might still be morally my inferior; he might be a
false prophet after all."

He took out his watch and looked at it, by this simple action
illustrating and reminding me of the difference between us--he talking
to pass away the time, I thinking aloud the gnawing question at my
heart.

"And you have no hope for anything beyond this?"

Something in my voice must have struck his ear, trained like every other
organ of observation to quick and fine perception, for he looked at me
more attentively, and it was in a gentler tone that he said--

"Surely, you do not mean for a life beyond this? One's best hope must be
that the whole miserable business ends with death."

"Have you found life so wretched?"

"I am not speaking from my own particular point of view. I am
singularly, exceptionally, fortunate, I am healthy; I have tastes which
I can gratify, work which I keenly enjoy. Whether the tastes are worth
gratifying or the work worth doing I cannot say. At least they act as an
anodyne to self-consciousness; they help me to forget the farce in
which I play my part. Like Solomon, and all who have had the best of
life, I call it vanity. What do you suppose it is to those--by far the
largest number, remember--who have had the worst of it? To them it is
not vanity, it is misery."

"But they suffer under the invariable laws you speak of--laws working
towards deliverance and happiness in the future."

"The future? Yes, I know that form of consolation which seems to satisfy
so many. To me it seems a hollow one. I have never yet been able to
understand how any amount of ecstasy enjoyed by B a million years hence
can make up for the torture A is suffering to-day. I suppose, dealing so
much with individuals as I do, I am inclined to individualise like a
woman. I think of units rather than of the mass. At this moment I have
before me a patient now left suffering pain as acute as any the rack
ever inflicted. How does it affect his case that centuries later such
pain may be unknown?"

"Of course, the individual's one and only hope is a future existence.
Then it may be all made up to him."

"I see no reason to hope so. Either there is no God, and we shall stil