The Soul's Probation: Scene 11

Ahriman: So Benedictus spun a cunning web Of thought, whose pattern thou hast followed out, And now thou art fast bound in error's toils. Thornasius too and e'en Capesius Are victims of this same illusion's spell. For at the same time as thine eyes beheld This long-past earthly life—so too did theirs. Henceforward 'tis in that time thou dost seek To find the causes of thy present life; But only error can be error's fruit If thou art ready to allow thyself To make the path of duty here and now Depend upon such vain imaginings. That Benedictus took from thine own brain, And placed these visions in an earlier age, Thine own self's knowledge can quite clearly prove. Thou sawst people of this present time But little changed from those of former days. Woman thou sawst as woman, man as man, And all their attributes were similar; Thou canst not therefore any longer doubt That what thou didst transfer to time's dim past By spirit-vision, far from being truth Was but the vain delusion of thy soul.