elect those testings in part the soul

position to judge than you; you are enmeshed in
the toils of the West. We can stand aside and evaluate.
You have but the local news, we have the world."
Humbly I remained silent, awaiting a continuation of the
message, agreeing within myself that "They" obviously
knew what was right. After some interval, the Voice came
again. "You have suffered much unjustly, but it has been
in a good cause. Your previous work has brought much
good to many, but you are ill and your judgment is at
fault and warped on the subject of the next book."
As I listened I reached out for my age-old crystal and
held it before me on its dull black cloth. Quickly the glass
clouded and became as white as milk. A rift appeared, and
the white clouds were parted like the drawing aside of cur-
tains to let in the light of the dawn. I saw as I heard. A
distant view of the towering Himalayas, their tops mantled
in snow. A sharp sensation of falling so real that I felt my
stomach rising within me. The landscape becoming larger,
and then, the Cave, the New Home of Knowledge. I saw
an Aged Patriarch, a very ancient figure indeed, sitting on
a folded rug of yak wool. Although a High Abbot, he was
clad simply in a faded, tattered robe, which seemed almost
as ancient as he. His high, domed head glistened like old
parchment, and the skin of his wrinkled old hands scarce
covered the bones which supported it. He was a venerable
figure, with a strong aura of power, and with the ineffable
serenity which true knowledge gives. Around him, in a
circle of which he was the center, sat seven lamas of high
degree. They sat in the attitude of meditation, with their
palms face-up and their fingers entwined in the immemorial
symbolic clasp. Their heads, slightly bowed, all pointed
towards me. In my crystal it was as if I were in


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