believe in the truth of this proposition. But if it be true, of course
it remains difficult to obtain a clear view of other parts of the column
than that in which we happen to find ourselves objectively conscious at
any given period, and needless to say impossible to see it from base to
capital.

However this may be, no individual entity pervades all the column.
There are great sections of it with which that entity has nothing to
do, although it always seems to appear again above. I suppose that those
sections which are empty of an individual and his atmosphere represent
the intervals between his lives which he spends in sleep, or in states
of existence with which this world is not concerned, but of such gulfs
of oblivion and states of being I know nothing.

To take a single instance of what I do know: once this spirit of mine,
that now by the workings of destiny for a little while occupies the body
of a fourth-rate auctioneer, and of the editor of a trade journal, dwelt
in that of a Pharaoh of Egypt--never mind which Pharoah. Yes, although
you may laugh and think me mad to say it, for me the legions fought
and thundered; to me the peoples bowed and the secret sanctuaries were
opened that I and I alone might commune with the gods; I who in the
flesh and after it myself was worshipped as a god.

Well, of this forgotten Royalty of whom little is known save what a
few inscriptions have to tell, there remains a portrait statue in the
British Museum. Sometimes I go to look at that statue and try to recall
exactly under what circumstances I caused it to be shaped, puzzling out
the story bit by bit.

Not long ago I stood thus absorbed and did not notice that the hour of