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he was standing in a wild, bare country. something about it seemed vaguely familiar: the land rose and fell in dull and weary undulations, in a vast circle of dun ploughland and grey meadow, bounded by a dim horizon without promise or hope, dreary as a prison wall. the infinite melancholy of an autumn evening brooded heavily over all the world, and the sky was hidden by livid clouds.
it all brought back to him some far-off memory, and yet he knew that he gazed on that sad plain for the first time. there was a deep and heavy silence over all; a silence unbroken by so much as the fluttering of a leaf. the trees seemed of a strange shape, and strange were the stunted thorns dotted about the broken field in which he stood. a little path at his feet, bordered by the thorn bushes, wandered away to the left into the dim twilight; it had about it some indefinable air of mystery, as if it must lead one down into a mystic region where all earthly things are forgotten and lost for ever.
he sat down beneath the bare, twisted boughs of a great tree and watched the dreary land grow darker and yet darker; he wondered, half-consciously, where he was and how he had come to that place, remembering, faintly, tales of like adventure. a man passed by a familiar wall one day, and opening a door before unnoticed, found himself in a new world of unsurmised and marvellous experiences. another man shot an arrow farther than any of his friends and became the husband of the fairy. yet — this was not fairyland; these were rather the sad fields and unhappy graves of the underworld than the abode of endless pleasures and undying delights. and yet in all that he saw there was the promise of great wonder.
only one thing was clear to him. he knew that he was ambrose, that he had been driven from great and unspeakable joys into miserable exile and banishment. he had come from a far, far place by a hidden way, and darkness had closed about him, and bitter drink and deadly meat were given him, and all gladness was hidden from him. this was all he could remember; and now he was astray, he knew not how or why, in this wild, sad land, and the night descended dark upon him.
suddenly there was, as it were, a cry far away in the shadowy silence, and the thorn bushes began to rustle before a shrilling wind that rose as the night came down. at this summons the heavy clouds broke up and dispersed, fleeting across the sky, and the pure heaven appeared with the last rose flush of the sunset dying from it, and there shone the silver light of the evening star. ambrose’s heart was drawn up to this light as he gazed: he saw that the star grew greater and greater; it advanced towards him through the air; its beams pierced to his soul as if they were the sound of a silver trumpet. an ocean of white splendour flowed over him: he dwelt within the star.
it was but for a moment; he was still sitting beneath the tree of the twisted branches. but the sky was now clear and filled with a great peace; the wind had fallen and a more happy light shone on the great plain. ambrose was thirsty, and then he saw that beside the tree there was a well, half hidden by the arching roots that rose above it. the water was still and shining, as though it were a mirror of black marble, and marking the brim was a great stone on which were cut the letters:
“fons vitae immortalis.”
he rose and, bending over the well, put down his lips to drink, and his soul and body were filled as with a flood of joy. now he knew that all his days of exile he had borne with pain and grief a heavy, weary body. there had been dolours in every limb and achings in every bone; his feet had dragged upon the ground, slowly, wearily, as the feet of those who go in chains. but dim, broken spectres, miserable shapes and crooked images of the world had his eyes seen; for they were eyes bleared with sickness, darkened by the approach of death. now, indeed, he clearly beheld the shining vision of things immortal. he drank great draughts of the dark, glittering water, drinking, it seemed, the light of the reflected stars; and he was filled with life. every sinew, every muscle, every particle of the deadly flesh shuddered and quickened in the communion of that well-water. the nerves and veins rejoiced together; all his being leapt with gladness, and as one finger touched another, as he still bent over the well, a spasm of exquisite pleasure quivered and thrilled through his body. his heart throbbed with bliss that was unendurable; sense and intellect and soul and spirit were, as it were, sublimed into one white flame of delight. and all the while it was known to him that these were but the least of the least of the pleasures of the kingdom, but the overrunnings and base tricklings of the great supernal cup. he saw, without amazement, that, though the sun had set, the sky now began to flush and redden as if with the northern light. it was no longer the evening, no longer the time of the procession of the dusky night. the darkness doubtless had passed away in mortal hours while for an infinite moment he tasted immortal drink; and perhaps one drop of that water was endless life. but now it was the preparation for the day. he heard the words:
“dies venit, dies tua
in qua reflorent omnia.”
they were uttered within his heart, and he saw that all was being made ready for a great festival. over everything there was a hush of expectation; and as he gazed he knew that he was no longer in that weary land of dun ploughland and grey meadow, of the wild, bare trees and strange stunted thorn bushes. he was on a hillside, lying on the verge of a great wood; beneath, in the valley, a brook sang faintly under the leaves of the silvery willows; and beyond, far in the east, a vast wall of rounded mountain rose serene towards the sky. all about him was the green world of the leaves: odours of the summer night, deep in the mystic heart of the wood, odours of many flowers, and the cool breath rising from the singing stream mingled in his nostrils. the world whitened to the dawn, and then, as the light grew clear, the rose clouds blossomed in the sky and, answering, the earth seemed to glitter with rose-red sparks and glints of flame. all the east became as a garden of roses, red flowers of living light shone over the mountain, and as the beams of the sun lit up the circle of the earth a bird’s song began from a tree within the wood. then were heard the modulations of a final and exultant ecstasy, the chant of liberation, a magistral in exitu; there was the melody of rejoicing trills, of unwearied, glad reiterations of choirs ever aspiring, prophesying the coming of the great feast, singing the eternal antiphon.
as the song aspired into the heights, so there aspired suddenly before him the walls and pinnacles of a great church set upon a high hill. it was far off, and yet as though it were close at hand he saw all the delicate and wonderful imagery cut in its stones. the great door in the west was a miracle: every flower and leaf, every reed and fern, were clustered in the work of the capitals, and in the round arch above moulding within moulding showed all the beasts that god has made. he saw the rose-window, a maze of fretted tracery, the high lancets of the fair hall, the marvellous buttresses, set like angels about this holy house, whose pinnacles were as a place of many springing trees. and high above the vast, far-lifted vault of the roof rose up the spire, golden in the light. the bells were ringing for the feast; he heard from within the walls the roll and swell and triumph of the organ:
o pius o bonus o placidus sonus hymnus eorum.
he knew not how he had taken his place in this great procession, how, surrounded by ministrants in white, he too bore his part in endless litanies. he knew not through what strange land they passed in their fervent, admirable order, following their banners and their symbols that glanced on high before them. but that land stood ever, it seemed, in a clear, still air, crowned with golden sunlight; and so there were those who bore great torches of wax, strangely and beautifully adorned with golden and vermilion ornaments. the delicate flame of these tapers burned steadily in the still sunlight, and the glittering silver censers as they rose and fell tossed a pale cloud into the air. they delayed, now and again, by wayside shrines, giving thanks for unutterable compassions, and, advancing anew, the blessed company surged onward, moving to its unknown goal in the far blue mountains that rose beyond the plain. there were faces and shapes of awful beauty about him; he saw those in whose eyes were the undying lamps of heaven, about whose heads the golden hair was as an aureole; and there were they that above the girded vesture of white wore dyed garments, and as they advanced around their feet there was the likeness of dim flames.
the great white array had vanished and he was alone. he was tracking a secret path that wound in and out through the thickets of a great forest. by solitary pools of still water, by great oaks, worlds of green leaves, by fountains and streams of water, by the bubbling, mossy sources of the brooks he followed this hidden way, now climbing and now descending, but still mounting upward, still passing, as he knew, farther and farther from all the habitations of men. through the green boughs now he saw the shining sea-water; he saw the land of the old saints, all the divisions of the land that men had given to them for god; he saw their churches, and it seemed as if he could hear, very faintly, the noise of the ringing of their holy bells. then, at last, when he had crossed the old road, and had gone by the lightning-struck land and the fisherman’s well, he found, between the forest and the mountain, a very ancient and little chapel; and now he heard the bell of the saint ringing clearly and so sweetly that it was as it were the singing of the angels. within it was very dark and there was silence. he knelt and saw scarcely that the chapel was divided into two parts by a screen that rose up to the round roof. there was a glinting of shapes as if golden figures were painted on this screen, and through the joinings of its beams there streamed out thin needles of white splendour as if within there was a light greater than that of the sun at noonday. and the flesh began to tremble, for all the place was filled with the odours of paradise, and he heard the ringing of the holy bell and the voices of the choir that out-sang the fairy birds of rhiannon, crying and proclaiming:
“glory and praise to the conqueror of death: to the fountain of life unending.”
nine times they sang this anthem, and then the whole place was filled with blinding light. for a door in the screen had been opened, and there came forth an old man, all in shining white, on whose head was a gold crown. before him went one who rang the bell; on each side there were young men with torches; and in his hands he bore the mystery of mysteries wrapped about in veils of gold and of all colours, so that it might not be discerned; and so he passed before the screen, and the light of heaven burst forth from that which he held. then he entered in again by a door that was on the other side, and the holy things were hidden.
and ambrose heard from within an awful voice and the words:
woe and great sorrow are on him, for he hath looked unworthily into the tremendous mysteries, and on the secret glory which is hidden from the holy angels.
