"A vision," you say. "No, a little insight into things," I reply. "Am I
making a god of nature? Do not you? Have not the Mohammedans their god,
the Jews theirs, the Hindus theirs? No one knows God, my friend; man knows
only gods. And sometimes I meet mine."

I go home by a different route, which forms a vast arc with the one I came
by. The sun is warmer now and the ground less smooth. I reach a great
ruin, the remnant of a landslide, and here, to amuse myself, I pretend to
be tired, flinging myself on the ground exactly as though someone were
watching me and saw how exhausted I am. It is only for my amusement,
because my brain has been idle so long. The sky is clear everywhere; the
clusters of mist over the Tore peaks are gone, heaven knows where, but
they have stolen away. In their place, an eagle swings in great circles
over the valley. Huge, black, and inaccessible, he traces ring after ring
as though held on a rail in the air, moving with voluptuous languor, a
thick-necked male, a winged stallion exulting. It is like music to watch
him. At length he disappears behind the peaks.

And here are only myself and the ruin and the little juniper trees. What
miracles all things are! These stones in the ruin perhaps hold some
meaning; they have lain here for thousands of years, but perhaps they,
too, roam, and make an inexpressible journey. The glaciers move, the land
rises, and the land falls; there is no hurry here. But since my
consciousness cannot associate fact with such a conception, it grows blind
with fury and revolts: The ruin cannot move; these are mere words, a game!

This ruin is a town; here and there lie scattered buildings of stone. It's
a peaceable gathering, without sensations or suicides, and perhaps a
well-shaped soul sits in each of these stones. But heaven protect me just