V. M.

“ Others had told these things; others had striven to show the glorious light of life that shines behind the cold mist of sin and sorrow which has been cast like a veil over the earth; but all had been rejected. Some were ill-received; some were stoned; some were killed.
“How can I raise this humanity which like a great orphan has cut itself off from its mother and now lies ignorant of the happiness that awaits its coming?” thought Eline. ”

“ But when Eline looked amid the rare flowers and found a little purple star with heart of gold, she knew that it was a flower from the king’s garden, and she was glad that it could grow where all was rock before. There were great purple pansies, too, like thoughts from the palace in which Eline had lived.
Now it was that the children came to the temple to learn of Eline, and she taught them the wonderful truths which she knew; to them she told the wonderful things that have been and the more wonderful things [56] that may be, if men will only try to bring them about. ”

“ Eline saw how the desire to possess more than enough, for the selfish pleasure of saying, “It is mine!”—how the growth of selfishness in the world; the love of killing nature’s younger sons for food and pleasure increased; how the love of ease and forgetfulness of others and of duty to mother nature—how all these things had chilled [35] the warmth of the one great life that is in all things, and crippled the mother’s efforts to help her wayward sons. ”

“ Once upon a time there was a beautiful palace where the king’s children lived as happily as they alone can live. They never wanted anything and they never knew that there could be others who were not as happy as they. Sometimes, it is true, they would hear a story which would make them almost think that perhaps there was a world beyond, which they did not know, outside the palace of the king and its gardens, but something would seem to say that after all it was only a fairy story, and they would forget that it meant anything that might really be true. ”

“ One of the little princesses seemed to think more of these stories of a world beyond the palace garden than the others, and she would sometimes find herself gazing at the sun, and wondering if the great world lay beyond the purple forests where the golden-edged clouds shone like dark mountains in the distance. ”

“ The boy listened and at once he knew what the flowers were whispering.
“There is a saying that the flax-people are being used for a mighty work,” said one little blue fairy to another.
“I heard a bee spreading the news,” said another. “All the flax-people are asked to give their dresses to help in clearing the plain for a palace and a garden where kings may dwell—not kings of earth and of little cities, but kings of wisdom whom nature loves to obey, and we among her children.”
“Body after body have I grown,” said the other. ”

“ For we are not at all separate from any other thing in the world, but the same nature is in us as in them—in the rocks and the flowers, in the forests and streams, in city and mountain, in air and fire and water, just as the rocks and [57] this temple are of the same stone, although they differ in shape. And if we only will, we can make all our rocks into beautiful, glorious temples. ”

“ And when she said that life itself to her was music, Eline’s teachers did not understand.
One said: “She has learned these things before in another life.”
Another declared: “She sees the heart of things where we see only the outer covering. She sees the soul, we the body.” ”

“ She taught them things so simple that they often wondered why they had not already known them without the telling. They did not know that there was a good reason why it should be so. Eline taught them, too, how by all working together for the welfare and progress of all, there is no task we may not overcome.
“We know it,” said the children, remembering the waste of rocks in the plain where now the garden stood and the temple.
“Each by himself can do much, but all working together can move the world,” she said. ”

“ Then in life after life Eline seemed to see her other selves living and loving and working, sleeping and suffering and struggling. She saw that on a day she had made her great resolve to help the world. “I will return! I will! I will!”
And now she knew what things they were she had seemed to remember in the king’s garden of delight. Joyously, eagerly, willingly, she saw that she had determined to return to earth in body after body, to help [16] the men of sorrow who struggled and slumbered and suffered. ”

“ When the world of men has learned this lesson the earth itself will become a mighty temple, that the wise teachers of old, whom men call gods, may come to us again and live with us in peace for evermore.
“And it shall be known that music is life, for in music is harmony, and by harmony all things live, each note in its own place, doing its perfect work, be it great or small. ”

“ In the center of the arch was placed a great light which was ever kept burning, for it was fed with oil of gold which never burns away, but whose smoke ever turns to oil again. Each light was like the greater light which ever shone from the dome of the temple, a light to lighten all around, such light as it was said went out to the world from the temple itself in the knowledge of the laws of life and of all things good and great and beautiful. ”

“ Clearer and clearer grew the space. Where before the stones had been, little pools of water formed, while round them grew masses of beautiful flowers, among which was a new crop of the little blue flax, stronger and better grown than any that had been there before. Gradually there grew up a great wall of rock around the plain where the boulders were drawn by the children, for each was taken to its nearest boundary, as Eline told them this would be the simplest way to clear the plain. ”

“ As time passed by Eline came to know more and more of that other life and she longed to tell these things to the people who struggled and surged in hot strife to win the things of the world they knew, never thinking that there was a happier, purer, brighter world. Some thought they knew of such a one; but all except a few made it seem like the one in which they lived—only they made it a little more bright by day, a little more dark by night, and with a little more success in the strife for the [31] things that change and pass away. ”

“ Seeing the beauty of the temple and the mighty work that comes of aiding nature, working in unity and harmony, they also built their houses to be like the temple. Stone they used for brick, beautiful they built them within and without, and they labored to make their dwellings fit temples for the gods. ”

“ And she would have told them how in those times man did not earn his living by toil unending, by ceaseless pain and sorrow, but that nature helped him as he helped her, and the earth brought out her stores of rich fruits for the welfare of her upgrown sons, well knowing that they in turn with loving service would seek to make nobler and better that which nature gave to them in charge, birds and beasts, flowers and trees, plants and stones and all that lives—which is everything. ”

“ You are yet young and there are many, many years of happiness before you. You may stay in the palace where all things are good, and put these things out of mind. There is another world, but not for you—yet!”
Eline was troubled, or would have been had such a thing been possible in the palace of the king. ”

“ Because in those days the people listened to the teachings from the temple and to the great ones who came to dwell therein when it was finished, and who taught the seekers after truth, through their messenger Eline, there were happiness and joy and peace in all the land. Men became nobler as they thought of nobler things than had hitherto been their custom. ”

“ But these Eline said should stand, as also some smaller ones which were placed across their tops like great beams resting upon a doorway. [54] How this was done I cannot say; but there is a saying in the city that, in the night before they were found placed high above the giant circle, the sound of a great and joyous song, a hymn of power, was heard like the tones of a great bell shaking the houses with its vibrations and putting men in fear of the destruction of their city. But at sunset the children had not returned from the plain, so that they were not in the city when this happened. ”

“ But curiously enough, the two who gave the reasons I have told, were laughed at and told that such things could not be. So they said little about their thoughts because, like all those who are sure that they know the truth, they could afford to wait until their words were proved to be right.
[33] VI
At first Eline longed to tell the world of better things. She would gladly have told the world of the glorious masonry of those noble cities which she saw in her visions—cities where men and women moved like gods; where sorrow and want and selfishness seemed to be unknown. ”

“ Eline knew of times in the past—times that will come again—when man did not ever strive to [34] be rich regardless of his poorer brothers, but each worked as he was able, all working for the whole world’s good. ”

“ Gently they suggested these things, gently these sayings took root, almost unperceived.
“Our temple which we have built is very mighty. It can never fall,” they said.
Some few there were who would have spoken for Eline, but they were timid and afraid of those who talked so boastfully. Wherefore they were silent. It is true that one or two attempted to recall the noble deeds of the absent one, and to point out that she had really built the temple; they had supplied only the labor ”

“ When this thing happened the neighbors would gather together and it was said:
“The Master has built the house.”
[59] Then the great beam which rested on the pillars of the doors was lifted and where it had stood was built an arch of stone. And last of all was dropped in place the keystone which held the arch, and there was great rejoicing, for the people said: “The house is finished.” Some there were who would have lifted the beam and built the arch, but unless the Master had been in the house, always some accident would occur and the house be destroyed. ”