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"But I could see Sheol, I could see its immensity, and I felt thepain of the souls there, and wondered at the new and intricate andever-changing patterns of confusion created by mortals as theydeparted one faith or sect or creed after another for that miserablemargin of gloom.
"Once a proud thought did come to me梩hat if I did penetrateSheol, I might instruct the souls there so thoroughly that theythemselves might transform it, create in it forms invented by hope ratherthan hopelessness, and some garden might be made of it in time.
Certainly the elect, the millions I had taken to Heaven, they hadtransformed their portion of the place. But then what if I failed atthis, and only added to the chaos? I didn't dare. I didn't dare, out offear of God and fear of my own inability to accomplish such a dream.
"I formulated many theories in my wanderings but I did notchange my mind on anything which I believed or felt or had spokento God. In fact, I prayed to Him often, though He was utterly silent,telling Him how much I continued to believe that He had desertedHis finest creation. And sometimes out of weariness I only sung Hispraises. Sometimes I was silent. Looking, hearing ... watching....
"Memnoch, the Watcher, the Fallen Angel.
"Little did I know my argument with Almighty God was onlybegun. But at a certain time, I found myself wandering back to thevery valleys which I had first visited, and where the first cities of menhad been built.
"This land for me was the land of beginnings, for though greatpeoples had sprung up in many nations, it was here that I had lainwith the Daughters of Men. And here that I had learnt something inthe flesh which I still held that God did not Himself know.
"Now, as I came to this place, I came into Jerusalem, which by theway is only six or seven miles west of here, where we now stand.
"And the times were immediately known to me, that the Romansgoverned the land, that the Hebrews had suffered a long and terriblecaptivity, and that those tribes going back to the very firstsettlements here梬ho had believed in the One God梬ere now underthe foot of the polytheists who did not take their legends with anyseriousness.
"And the Tribes of Monotheists, themselves, were divided onmany issues, with some Hebrews being strict Pharisees, and othersSadducees, and still others having sought to make pure communitiesin caves in those hills beyond.
"If there was one feature which made the times remarkable tome梩hat is, truly different from any other梚t was the might of theRoman Empire, which stretched farther than any empire of the Westwhich I had ever witnessed, and remained somehow in ignorance ofthe Great Empire of China, as if that were not of the same world.
"Something drew me to this spot, however, and I knew it. I senseda presence here that was not as strong as a summons; but it was as ifsomeone were crying out to me to come here, and yet would not usethe full power of his voice. I must search, I must wander. Maybe thisthing stalked and seduced me as I did you. I don't know.
"But I came here, and wandered Jerusalem, listening to what thetongues of men had to say.
"They spoke of the prophets and holy men of the wilderness, ofarguments over the law and purification and the will of God. Theyspoke of Holy Books and Holy Traditions. They spoke of men goingout to be 'baptized' in water so as to be 'saved' in the eyes of God.
"And they spoke of a man who had only lately gone into thewilderness after his baptism, because at the moment that he had steppedinto the River Jordan and the water had been poured over him, theskies had opened above this man, and Light had been seen from God.
"Of course one could hear stories like this all over the world. Itwas not unusual, except that it drew me. That this was my country;and I found myself as if directed, wandering out of Jerusalem to theeast, into the wasteland, my keen angelic senses telling me that I wasnear to the presence of something mysterious, something that partookof the sacred in a way that an angel would know upon seeing,and a man might not. My reason rejected it, yet I walked on and on,in the heat of the day, wingless and invisible into the very wastes."Memnoch drew me with him and we walked into the sand, whichwas not as deep as I had imagined, but was hot and full of little stones.
We moved on into canyons and up slopes and finally came to a littleclearing of sorts where rocks had been gathered, as if others werewont to come here from time to time. It was as natural as the otherplace we had chosen to remain for so long.
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