grim sneering smile, that seemed to look down on him from the
heights of their power and wisdom, with calm contempt .... him, the
poor youth, picking up the leaving and rags of their past majesty
.... He dared look at them no more.

So he looked past them into the temple halls; into a lustrous abyss
of cool green shade, deepening on and inward, pillar after pillar,
vista after vista, into deepest night. And dimly through the gloom
he could descry, on every wall and column, gorgeous arabesques, long
lines of pictured story; triumphs and labours; rows of captives in
foreign and fantastic dresses, leading strange animals, bearing the
tributes of unknown lands; rows of ladies at feasts, their heads
crowned with garlands, the fragrant lotus-flower in every hand,
while slaves brought wine and perfumes, and children sat upon their
knees, and husbands by their side; and dancing girls, in transparent
robes and golden girdles, tossed their tawny limbs wildly among the
throng .... What was the meaning of it all? Why had it all been?
Why had it gone on thus, the great world, century after century,
millennium after millennium, eating and drinking, and marrying and
giving in marriage, and knowing nothing better .... how could they
know anything better? Their forefathers had lost the light ages and
ages before they were born .... And Christ had not come for ages
and ages after they were dead .... How could they know? .... And
yet they were all in hell .... every one of them. Every one of
these ladies who sat there, with her bushy locks, and garlands, and
jewelled collars, and lotus-flowers, and gauzy dress, displaying all
her slender limbs-who, perhaps, when she was alive, smiled so
sweetly, and went so gaily, and had children, and friends, and never
once thought of what was going to happen to her--what must happen to
her .... She was in hell .... Burning for ever, and ever, and