The Mahatma and the Hare | Page 7

gallery had come. Still I stood and gazed and
dreamt till the policeman on duty, seeing and suspecting me, came up
and roughly ordered me to begone.
The man's tone angered me. I laid my hand on the foot of the statue, for
it had just come back to me that it was a "Ka" image, a sacred thing,
any Egyptologist will know what I mean, which for ages had sat in a
chamber of my tomb. Then the Ka that clings to it eternally awoke at
my touch and knew me, or so I suppose. At least I felt myself change.
A new strength came into me; my shape, battered in this world's storms,
put on something of its ancient dignity; my eyes grew royal. I looked at
that man as Pharaoh may have looked at one who had done him insult.
He saw the change and trembled--yes, trembled. I believe he thought I
was some imperial ghost that the shadows of evening had caused him
to mistake for man; at any rate he gasped out--
"I beg your pardon, I was obeying orders. I hope your Majesty won't
hurt me. Now I think of it I have been told that things come out of these
old statues in the night."
Then turning he ran, literally ran, where to I am sure I do not know,

probably to seek the fellowship of some other policeman. In due course
I followed, and, lifting the bar at the end of the hall, departed without
further question asked. Afterwards I was very glad to think that I had
done the man no injury. At the moment I knew that I could hurt him if I
would, and what is more I had the desire to do so. It came to me, I
suppose, with that breath of the past when I was so great and absolute.
Perhaps I, or that part of me then incarnate, was a tyrant in those days,
and this is why now I must be so humble. Fate is turning my pride to its
hammer and beating it out of me.
For thus in the long history of the soul it serves all our vices.

THE GREAT WHITE ROAD
Now, as I have hinted, under the teaching of Jorsen, who saved me
from degradation and self-murder, yes, and helped me with money until
once again I could earn a livelihood, I have acquired certain knowledge
and wisdom of a sort that are not common. That is, Jorsen taught me
the elements of these things; he set my feet upon the path which
thenceforward, having the sight, I have been able to follow for myself.
How I followed it does not matter, nor could I teach others if I would.
I am no member of any mystic brotherhood, and, as I have explained,
no Mahatma, although I have called myself thus for present purposes
because the name is a convenient cloak. I repeat that I am ignorant if
there are such people as Mahatmas, though if so I think Jorsen must be
one of them. Still he never told me this. What he has told is that every
individual spirit must work out its own destiny quite independently of
others. Indeed, being rather fond of fine phrases, he has sometimes
spoken to me of, or rather, insisted upon what he called "the lonesome
splendour of the human soul," which it is our business to perfect
through various lives till I can scarcely appreciate and am certainly
unable to describe.
To tell the truth, the thought of this "lonesome splendour" to which it
seems some of us may attain, alarms me. I have had enough of being
lonesome, and I do not ask for any particular splendour. My only
ambitions are to find those whom I have lost, and in whatever life I live
to be of use to others. However, as I gather that the exalted condition to
which Jorsen alludes is thousands of ages off for any of us, and may
after all mean something quite different to what it seems to mean, the

thought of it does not trouble me over much. Meanwhile what I seek is
the vision of those I love.
Now I have this power. Occasionally when I am in deep sleep some
part of me seems to leave my body and to be transported quite outside
the world. It travels, as though I were already dead, to the Gates that all
who live must pass, and there takes its stand, on the Great White Road,
watching those who have been called speed by continually. Those upon
the earth know nothing of that Road. Blinded by their pomps and
vanities, they cannot see, they will not see it always growing towards
the feet of every