to rush down the torrent of his will into the gulf of his existence, and there lose my own. I was almost as hard beset by him now as I had been once before, in a different way, by another. I was a fool both times. To have yielded then would have been an error of principle; to have yielded now would have been an error of judgment.

So I think at this hour, when I look back to the crisis through the quiet medium of time: I was unconscious of folly at the instant.

I stood motionless under my hierophant’s touch. My refusals were forgotten — my fears overcome — my wrestlings paralysed. The Impossible — i.e., my marriage with St. John — was fast becoming the Possible. All was changing utterly with a sudden sweep. Religion called — Angels beckoned — God commanded —