When she was seated Penloe said: "Excuse me for a minute or two," and Stella was pleased to do so, for she wanted to be in the room alone and take notes. But no sooner had Penloe left the room when a different state of mind came over her, and she did not feel like giving her attention to anything in the room. For such a wave of peace came over her mind as she had never experienced before, so that the room seemed to be full of peace. It was not a dead, sleepy peace, nor a dreamy peace, but a peace that was refreshing, strengthening, and was exactly what her mind needed. She sat in perfect bliss drinking in all she could, when Penloe came into the room. He seemed to her to be all peace. This delightful condition put her mind in a state of equipoise, such as she had never felt before; for it was a peace that was tinged with a Divine quality; and it was about to awaken her more than ever to the possibilities of the real world, the Divine world, the spiritual world, the world whose realization so far she had not a knowledge of. For her supreme life was in her intellectual tastes and in her deep, loving, true nature, which loved to see what was fitting, right, and just, actually lived; possessing at the same time the boldness and courage to be a pioneer of advanced thought, and, above all, she loved to live her ideas. On returning to the room Penloe opened the conversation by saying: "Well, Stella, could you find anything interesting in the books?" "Interesting, Penloe," said Stella. "Why, I have had a very rich treat in the perusal of them. I felt as if I could not put them down till I had finished them, for they contain just the light I have been seeking, and now they have become a part of my own mentality. But I wish you would explain the meaning of the expression, 'Sex is an illusion.'"