Page:The Great Secret.djvu/258

242 of those fierce and remorseless tyrants, was a thought to make Philip shudder. The flames of hell they must have passed through before they became even humanised. Apollonius sighed as he answered the thought.

"Yes, it takes many ages to teach an earth monarch like one of these, his true position in the eternal scheme, and many have to work hard for his salvation. Yet he has our pity, because the unlucky circumstances of birth have forced this evil lot upon him. Jehovah spoke plainly to Moses on the mountain, and warned him against this curse as He warned him against the savage craving for flesh which his followers had expressed. Again He spoke to Samuel against the evils they were bringing upon themselves when they would have a tyrant. Alas! it was a sorry elevation they gave the poor spirits, a limited number of years of god-like power to commit crime with impunity, to be paid for by after ages of degradation and misery. Happily the effects of evil are not all-enduring, so that the vilest may hope for liberty and reason at last."

Semiramis, the once fierce and deadly, came to them with the gentleness and charity of Hesperia. In her own land a certain pathos blended with her majesty of grace, for all round her were her former victims who had helped her out of her hell, and she was humble and grateful to them. The grandeur still remained to Assyria, but there was no more fear and trembling amongst the multitude. The past wrongs had been forgiven, and peace reigned over the land with plenty.

They visited Troy, and saw the famous Helen and Paris, with the bard Homer and the heroes of his Iliad. All lived now in harmony, for they had found their proper mates, and the mistakes of the past were