the prince saw that all was light. He saw that evil served its function, which was to provide the opposition needed for the light to grow, and keep growing; for there can be no good without evil, no light without darkness, day without night. But the destination of the soul was beyond good and evil, darkness and light, beyond it all. Evil was the ladder by which the difficult ascension was made. Evil was not the only way for the ascension, for the ascension was simpler by grace, goodness, love and natural flight – but evil was the one thing that humanity, in its blindness, was prey to, must overcome, transcend, and turn into light. Evil was a battle or a non-battle which humanity must win and overcome consciously in itself if it is to regain its former place, or find a new place, in heaven.
The prince was shown all this and understood it all in a flash, and much more besides. And what the ancestors said to him in songs, in music and in dances he absorbed but forgot, and would remember much later, in time, when needed, and when events so terrible would spring them out in his mind as his own thoughts, his own deeds.
But that night the visitations he attracted from the evil forms (to see them is to be seen by them), the shadows over things (they go where they must grow), and the ambiguous beings between things (if the space is there they fill up the air; if the space is not light, they grow there in might) – the visitations were so strong that they troubled the prince's sleep.
They occupied the prince's dreams because he was an open soul and gave all things habitation, and was not yet strong enough or fortified enough to resist such inhabitation. For this possession was part of the ritual fortification. First the soul must be infected with that which it will become impervious to; if it survives the attack, the foundation becomes impregnable; if it doesn't, a good person perishes, and has to begin again from where they left off the struggle. So it was with the prince.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The dreams he had were monstrous. The evil forms that visited him and the shadows over things that descended on him and the visions of the night were so terrible that a great unease entered his spirit. His dreams were mixed and confusing; and monsters with teeth all over their bodies appeared beside him and began to eat of his flesh, till only his heart remained. Liverish spirits with snake-like legs and eyes that reflected what they saw and bodies crawling with white worms slid into him and danced and wriggled in his being. A host of evil-looking critters took up occupation in his brain and held long meetings about how to conquer the kingdom of his soul.
And then he saw unspeakable acts of witchcraft and dark cultic activities – power-seekers who ate the brains of newborn babies, women who poisoned their husbands and married their brothers, men who murdered their wives and buried them in farmlands, warriors who beheaded the conquered and danced at night with their skulls under a luminous moon. The prince saw so much evil and he was the home of so many kinds of nightmare beings that he became ill. He fell into a deep illness because of all the evils in the kingdom that he was shown in his dreams. All the hidden evils affected him so powerfully that he slid into a profound sickness that lasted a long time.
Everyone thought he was going to die. He didn't eat. He didn't speak. And he barely stirred from his bed. He seemed unconscious for a long time and when he appeared to be awake he stared at the ceiling or at the sky for long hours without seeming to see anything. They said that his soul had fled from the home of his body and that his eyes longed for some place beyond the sky. He saw no one, recognised no one, not even the king.
They brought people to see him in his chamber, friends, beautiful young princesses whom he had been thought to favour, relations, and comedians. He stared through the friends, was deaf to the entreaties of
The prince was shown all this and understood it all in a flash, and much more besides. And what the ancestors said to him in songs, in music and in dances he absorbed but forgot, and would remember much later, in time, when needed, and when events so terrible would spring them out in his mind as his own thoughts, his own deeds.
But that night the visitations he attracted from the evil forms (to see them is to be seen by them), the shadows over things (they go where they must grow), and the ambiguous beings between things (if the space is there they fill up the air; if the space is not light, they grow there in might) – the visitations were so strong that they troubled the prince's sleep.
They occupied the prince's dreams because he was an open soul and gave all things habitation, and was not yet strong enough or fortified enough to resist such inhabitation. For this possession was part of the ritual fortification. First the soul must be infected with that which it will become impervious to; if it survives the attack, the foundation becomes impregnable; if it doesn't, a good person perishes, and has to begin again from where they left off the struggle. So it was with the prince.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The dreams he had were monstrous. The evil forms that visited him and the shadows over things that descended on him and the visions of the night were so terrible that a great unease entered his spirit. His dreams were mixed and confusing; and monsters with teeth all over their bodies appeared beside him and began to eat of his flesh, till only his heart remained. Liverish spirits with snake-like legs and eyes that reflected what they saw and bodies crawling with white worms slid into him and danced and wriggled in his being. A host of evil-looking critters took up occupation in his brain and held long meetings about how to conquer the kingdom of his soul.
And then he saw unspeakable acts of witchcraft and dark cultic activities – power-seekers who ate the brains of newborn babies, women who poisoned their husbands and married their brothers, men who murdered their wives and buried them in farmlands, warriors who beheaded the conquered and danced at night with their skulls under a luminous moon. The prince saw so much evil and he was the home of so many kinds of nightmare beings that he became ill. He fell into a deep illness because of all the evils in the kingdom that he was shown in his dreams. All the hidden evils affected him so powerfully that he slid into a profound sickness that lasted a long time.
Everyone thought he was going to die. He didn't eat. He didn't speak. And he barely stirred from his bed. He seemed unconscious for a long time and when he appeared to be awake he stared at the ceiling or at the sky for long hours without seeming to see anything. They said that his soul had fled from the home of his body and that his eyes longed for some place beyond the sky. He saw no one, recognised no one, not even the king.
They brought people to see him in his chamber, friends, beautiful young princesses whom he had been thought to favour, relations, and comedians. He stared through the friends, was deaf to the entreaties of
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