from this world. Their purpose is to steal you away, one of you or both."
"Steal us! Surely that would not be permitted?"
"It is not possible unless you yourselves give yourselves away."
"How should we give ourselves away?"
"If you submit your will to theirs they get power over you, power which is hard to shake off, and which is very easily increased."
Here he paused, and the smile which usually attended his pauses did not appear. A sad expression, severe yet very gentle, took its place. There was a silence of several seconds. Then I stood up and spoke, standing.
"Hear me, sir. I remember and repent my faults. I knew that this man was a bad man. Nay, I had begun to suspect that he was something other and worse than a bad man. But I saw that he knew things which I longed to know, and so I suffered myself to forget his badness and I did for the moment submit myself to his will. He exercised his power upon me and he deceived me in its exercise. He transferred me to the surface of the moon, or showed it me in a trance, I know not which. I am conscious ever since of being somehow in bondage to him; although I am now
