properties of nature, unknown only to those who seek not to know them;
of the splendid virtue inherent in all things, like the green and violet
flames in the clear colourless raindrops which are seen only on rare
occasions. Of life and death, he said that life was of the spirit which
never dies, that death meant only a passage, a change of abode of the
spirit, and the left body crumbled to dust when the spirit went out of
it to continue its existence elsewhere, but that those who hated the
thought of such change could, by taking thought, prolong life and live
for a thousand years, like the adder and tortoise or for ever. But no,
he would not leave the poor boy to grope alone and blindly after that
hidden knowledge he was burning to possess. He pitied him too much. The
means were simple and near to hand, the earth teemed with the virtue
that would save him from the dissolution which so appalled him. He would
be startled to hear in how small a thing and in how insignificant a
creature resided the principle that could make his body, like his
spirit, immortal. But exceeding great power often existed in small
compass: witness the adder's tooth, which was to our sight no more than
the point of the smallest thorn. Now, in the small ant there exists a
principle of a greater potency than any other in nature; so strong and
penetrating was it that even the dull and brutish kind of men who
enquire not into hidden things know something of its power. But the
greatest of all the many qualities of this acid was unknown to them. The
ants were a small people, but exceedingly wise and powerful. If a little
human child had the strength of an ant he would surpass in power the
mightiest giant that ever lived. In the same way ants surpassed men in
wisdom; and this strength and wisdom was the result of that acid
principle in them. Now, if any person should be able to overcome his
repugnance to so strange a food as to sustain himself on ants and
nothing else, the effect of the acid on him would be to change and
harden his flesh and make it impervious to decay or change of any kind.