In his powerful and prophetic story "In the Days of the Comet," H.G. Wells, tells of a _great change_ that comes over the world following an atmospheric phenomenon in which a "green vapor" is generated in the clouds and falls upon the earth with instantaneous effect. As this peculiar vapor descends, it has the effect of putting every one to sleep; this sleep continues for three days and when people finally awake, their interior nature has undergone a complete change. Where before they "saw dimly," they now see clearly; the petty differences and quarrels are perceived in their true perspective. Instead of place, and power, and influence, and wealth, being all-important goals of ambition as before the change, every one now strives to be of service to the world. Love and kindness become greater factors than commercial expediency and business success. In many respects, Wells' description of the great change and its effect upon people, corresponds with the effect of Illumination. The sense of entering into the very heart of things; of growing plants; the birds and the little wood animals; the intense sympathy and understanding of life described by him, sounds like the effect of cosmic consciousness, as related by nearly all who have attained it. How the world's activities are resumed after the change, and under what vastly different incentives people work, form a part of the story, which is written as fiction, but which contains the seed of a great truth. This truth is expressed in science, as human achievement, and in religion as fulfilled prophecy, but the truth is the same. Both religion and science point to a _time_ when this earth will know freedom from strife and suffering. Even the elements which have hitherto been regarded as beyond the boundaries of man's will, may be completely controlled; not _may be_, but _will be_. Manual labor will cease. National Eugenic societies will put a stop to war, when they come to the inevitable conclusion, that no race can by any possibility be improved, while the most perfect physical species are reserved for armies. Awakening woman will refuse--indeed they are now refusing--to bear children to be shot down in warfare, and crushed under the juggernaut of commercial competition. Those who realize the signs of the times, look for the birth of cosmic consciousness as a race-consciousness, foreshadowing the new day; the "second coming of Christ," not as a personal, vicarious sacrifice, but as a factor in human attainment. "For I am persuaded," said St. Paul, "that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God."