X. First Contemplation: How Michael prepares his earthly mission supersensibly, by the conquest of Lucifer.

Duke Earnest comes into conflict with the Emperor; and the emperor makes war unjustly upon him, to destroy him. To escape these impossible relations with the head of the empire, Duke Earnest sees himself obliged to join the crusade which is on its way to the East. In the various adventures that now befall him before his journey reaches its end, physical things and spiritual things are interwoven in the ‘legendary’ style above described. The duke, for instance, comes on his journey to a race of men with heads like cranes. He is cast with his vessels upon the ‘Magnetic Mountain,’ which attracts all ships by its magnetic power, so that people who come into the neighbourhood of the mountain cannot get away again, but are bound to perish miserably. Duke Earnest and his followers manage to escape by sewing themselves into skins and letting themselves be carried off by griffins, who are used to come down and prey upon the people who have been cast on the Magnetic Mountain. They are carried to a mountain top; and there, whilst the griffins are away, they cut themselves out of the skins and so escape. After further wanderings, they come to a people whose ears are so long that they can wrap them round their whole body like a coat; and then to another race of people with such big feet that when it rains they lie down on the ground and spread their feet over them like umbrellas. They come to a race of dwarfs, a race of giants, and so on. A great deal of this kind comes into the tale, as part of Duke Earnest's adventures upon his crusade. This ‘legend’ does not let one feel—in the way one should, wherever ‘Imaginations’ come in—that here the story is passing into a spiritual sphere, telling in pictures of things that are going on in the astral world and have a connection with the wills and the fate of the people upon earth.