What can death be? The body decays, andthe soul. Yes; what is the soul, and whither does it go?"
  "To eternal life," says the comforting voice of religion.
  "But what is this change? Where and how shall we exist?"
  "Above; in heaven," answers the pious man; "it is there we hope togo."
  "Above!" repeated the wise man, fixing his eyes upon the moonand stars above him. He saw that to this earthly sphere above andbelow were constantly changing places, and that the position variedaccording to the spot on which a man found himself. He knew, also,that even if he ascended to the top of the highest mountain whichrears its lofty summit on this earth, the air, which to us seems clearand transparent, would there be dark and cloudy; the sun would havea coppery glow and send forth no rays, and our earth would lie beneathhim wrapped in an orange-colored mist. How narrow are the limits whichconfine the bodily sight, and how little can be seen by the eye of thesoul. How little do the wisest among us know of that which is soimportant to us all.
  In the most secret chamber of the castle lay the greatest treasureon earth- the Book of Truth. The wise man had read it through pageafter page. Every man may read in this book, but only in fragments. Tomany eyes the characters seem so mixed in confusion that the wordscannot be distinguished. On certain pages the writing often appears sopale or so blurred that the page becomes a blank. The wiser a manbecomes, the more he will read, and those who are wisest read most.
  The wise man knew how to unite the sunlight and the moonlight withthe light of reason and the hidden powers of nature; and throughthis stronger light, many things in the pages were made clear tohim. But in the portion of the book entitled "Life after Death" nota single point could he see distinctly. This pained him. Should henever be able here on earth to obtain a light by which everythingwritten in the Book of Truth should become clear to him? Like the wiseKing Solomon, he understood the language of animals, and couldinterpret their talk into song; but that made him none the wiser. Hefound out the nature of plants and metals, and their power in curingdiseases and arresting death, but none to destroy death itself. In allcreated things within his reach he sought the light that shouldshine upon the certainty of an eternal life, but he found it not.The Book of Truth lay open before him, but, its pages were to him asblank paper. Christianity placed before him in the Bible a promiseof eternal life, but he wanted to read it in his book, in whichnothing on the subject appeared to be written.
  He had five children; four sons, educated as the children ofsuch a wise father should be, and a daughter, fair, gentle, andintelligent, but she was blind; yet this deprivation appeared asnothing to her; her father and brothers were outward eyes to her,and a vivid imagination made everything clear to her mental sight. Thesons had never gone farther from the castle than the branches of thetrees extended, and the sister had scarcely ever left home. Theywere happy children in that home of their childhood, the beautiful andfragrant Tree of the Sun. Like all children, they loved to hearstories related to them, and their father told them many thingswhich other children would not have understood; but these were asclever as most grownup people are among us. He explained to themwhat they saw in the pictures of life on the castle walls- thedoings of man, and the progress of events in all the lands of theearth; and the sons often expressed a wish that they could be present,and take a part in these great deeds. Then their father told them thatin the world there was nothing but toil and difficulty: that it wasnot quite what it appeared to them, as they looked upon it in theirbeautiful home. He spoke to them of the true, the beautiful, and thegood, and told them that these three held together in the world, andby that union they became crystallized into a precious jewel,clearer than a diamond of the first water- a jewel, whose splendor hada value even in the sight of God, in whose brightness all things aredim. This jewel was called the philosopher's stone. He told them that,by searching, man could attain to a knowledge of the existence of God,and that it was in the power of every man to discover the certaintythat such a jewel as the philosopher's stone really existed. Thisinformation would have been beyond the perception of other children;but these children understood, and others will learn to comprehend itsmeaning after a time. They questioned their father about the true, thebeautiful, and the good, and he explained it to them in many ways.He told them that God, when He made man out of the dust of theearth, touched His work five times, leaving five intense feelings,which we call the five senses. Through these, the true, the beautiful,and the good are seen, understood, and perceived, and through thesethey are valued, protected, and encouraged. Five senses have beengiven mentally and corporeally, inwardly and outwardly, to body andsoul.
  The children thought deeply on all these things, and meditatedupon them day and night. Then the eldest of the brothers dreamt asplendid dream. Strange to say, not only the second brother but alsothe third and fourth brothers all dreamt exactly the same thing;namely, that each went out into the world to find the philosopher'sstone. Each dreamt that he found it, and that, as he rode back onhis swift horse, in the morning dawn, over the velvety greenmeadows, to his home in the castle of his father, that the stonegleamed from his forehead like a beaming light; and threw such abright radiance upon the pages of the Book of Truth that every wordwas illuminated which spoke of the life beyond the grave. But thesister had no dream of going out into the wide world; it never enteredher mind. Her world was her father's house.
  "I shall ride forth into the wide world," said the eldest brother."I must try what life is like there, as I mix with men. I willpractise only the good and true; with these I will protect thebeautiful. Much shall be changed for the better while I am there."
  Now these thoughts were great and daring, as our thoughtsgenerally are at home, before we have gone out into the world, andencountered its storms and tempests, its thorns and its thistles. Inhim, and in all his brothers, the five senses were highlycultivated, inwardly and outwardly; but each of them had one sensewhich in keenness and development surpassed the other four. In thecase of the eldest, this pre-eminent sense was sight, which he hopedwould be of special service. He had eyes for all times and all people;eyes that could discover in the depths of the earth hiddentreasures, and look into the hearts of men, as through a pane ofglass; he could read more than is often seen on the cheek that blushesor grows pale, in the eye that droops or smiles. Stags and antelopesaccompanied him to the western boundary of his home, and there hefound the wild swans. These he followed, and found himself far away inthe north, far from the land of his father, which extended eastward tothe ends of the earth. How he opened his eyes with astonishment!