arguments, but rather ask after novelties in the world of ideas. I open for them the vestibule to the temple of Isis, and say, by way of preliminary, that occultism is going to be the vogue. Then they rage, and cut me down with the same weapons which during twenty years I have been forging against superstition and mysticism.

Since these debates always take place in garden-restaurants to the accompaniment of wine-drinking, one avoids violent arguments, and I confine myself to relating facts and real occurrences, assuming the mask of an enlightened sceptic. It can certainly not be said that people are opposed to everything new—quite the contrary; but they become conservative as regards ideals which have been won by hard fighting and which one is not inclined to desert. Still less are they disposed to abjure a faith which has been purchased by a baptism of blood. It falls to my share to strike out a path between naturalism and supernaturalism, by expounding the latter as a development of the former.

For this purpose, I address myself to the problem of giving, as just indicated, natural and scientific explanation for all the mysterious phenomena which appear to us. I split up my personality and show to the world a rationalistic occultist, but I keep my innermost individuality unimpaired and cherish the germ of a creedless religion. Often my outer rôle gets the upper hand; my two natures become so intricately intermixed that I can laugh at my newly won belief. This helps my theories to find entrance into the most oppositely constituted minds.

The gloomy December days drag on lazily under a dark-grey smoky sky. Although I have discovered Swedenborg's explanation regarding the character of my sufferings, I cannot bring myself once for all to bend under the hand of the Powers. My disposition to make objections asserts itself, and I continually refer the real causes of my suffering to external things, especially the malice of men. Attacked day and night by "electric streams," which compress my chest and stab my heart, I quit my torture-chamber, and visit the tavern where I find friends. Fearing sobriety, I drink ceaselessly, as the only way of procuring sleep at night. Shame and disgust, however, combined with restlessness, compel me to give this up, and for some evenings I visit the Temperance Café called the "Blue Band." But the company one meets with there depresses me,—bluish, pale, and emaciated faces, terrible and malicious eyes, and a silence which is not the peace of God.

When things go wrong, wine is a benefit, and refraining from it a punishment. I return to the half-sober tavern, without, however, transgressing the bounds of moderation, after having disciplined myself for several evenings by drinking tea.

Christmas is approaching, and I regard the children's festival with a cool bitterness that I can hardly dignify with the name of resignation. For six years I have had all kinds of sufferings, and am now prepared for anything. Loneliness in an hotel! That has long been my nightmare, and I have become accustomed to it. It seems as though the very thing that I dislike is forced upon me.

Meanwhile a closer intimacy has sprung up between me and a friendly circle, so that they begin to make confidences to me. The fact is that during the last months so many things have happened, so many unusual unexpected things. "Let me hear them," I say. "They tell me that the head of the revolutionary students, the freest of freethinkers, after having come out of a temperance hospital and taking the pledge, has been now converted, so that he forthwith——"

"Well, what?"

"Sings penitential psalms."

"Incredible!"

In fact the young man, who was unusually gifted, had for the present spoilt his prospects by attacking the views prevalent at the university, including the misuse of strong drink. When I arrived in the town he kept a little aloof from me on the ground of his temperance principles, but it was he who lent me Swedenborg's Arcana Coelestia, which he had taken from his father's library. I remember that after I had begun to read the work I gave him an account of Swedenborg's theories, and suggested to him to read the prophet in order to gain light, but he interrupted me with a gesture of alarm.

"No! I will not! Not now! Later!"

"Are you afraid?"

"Yes, for the moment."

"But read it merely as a literary curiosity."

"No."

I thought at first he was joking, but later on it became clear to me that he was quite in earnest. So there seems to be a general awakening going on through the world, and I need not conceal my own experiences.

"Tell me, old fellow, can you sleep at night?"

"Not much. When I lie awake my whole past life comes in review before me; all the follies which I have committed, all my sufferings and unhappiness pass by, but especially the follies. And when the procession ends, it commences all over again."

"You also?"

"What do you mean by 'also'?"

"That is the disease of our time. They call it 'the mills of God.'"

At the word "God" he makes a grimace and answers, "Yes, it is a queer age we live in; the world turns round and round."

"Or rather it is the re-entrance of the Powers."

The Christmas week is over. In consequence of the holidays my table companions are scattered over the neighbourhood of Lund. One fine morning my friend, the doctor and psychologist, comes and shows me a letter from our friend the poet, containing an invitation to his parents' house, a country property a few miles from the town. I decline to go as I dislike travelling.

"But he is unhappy," says the doctor.

"What is the matter with him?"

"Sleeplessness; you know he has lately been keeping Christmas."

I take shelter behind the excuse of having some business to do, and the question remains undecided. In the afternoon I get another letter, to say that the poet is ill and wants his friend's medical advice.

"What is he suffering from now?" I ask.

"He suffers from neurasthenia and believes himself persecuted——"

"By demons?"

"Not exactly that, but anyhow——"

An access of grim humour elicited by the fact of having a brother in misfortune makes me determine to go with him. "Very well then, let us start," I say; "you see to the medicine and I will see to the exorcism." When the matter is settled, I pack my portmanteau, and as I go down the hotel steps I am unexpectedly accosted by an unknown female.

"Excuse me, are you Dr. Norberg?"

"No, I am not," I answer, not exactly politely, for I thought she was a disreputable person.

"Could you tell me what time it is?" she continued.

"No!"

And I go off.

How unmeaningful this scene was, it did nevertheless leave me with me an unsettling impression.

In the evening we stay in a village, to pass the night there. I have just entered my room, on the first floor, and washed up a little, when the usual sounds reach my ears; someone moves furniture around and I hear dance-steps.

This time I don't leave it with a suspicion, but run in the company of my comrades up the servants' stairs, to get certainty. But upstairs nothing suspicious can be found, because above my room, under the roofpanes, there's nobody living.

After a bad night with little sleep, we continue our journey and a couple of hours later we are in the parental home of the Poet, who almost appears as a prodigal son before religious parents, good and honest man. The day is spent with walks in a beautiful country-side and innocent conversations. The evening descends and brings an indescribable peace in a very homely environment, in which the doctor and I seem completely lost to ourselves, he even more than I, because he's an atheist.

Late in the evening we retire to the room that was assigned to the Doctor and me. When I'm searching for something to read, I lay hands upon "Magic of the Middle Ages" by Viktor Rydberg. Again this writer, whom I avoided, as long as he