The hero follows, and finds he is brought to a “theosophical monastery,” in a hidden valley of the most gorgeous description. Therein he meets, to his surprise, with adepts of both sexes; for, as he learns later:— “What has intelligence to do with the sex of the body? Where the sexual instincts end, there ends the influence of the sex.” Meanwhile, he is brought into the presence of a male adept of majestic appearance, who welcomes and informs him that he is among “The Brothers of the Golden and Rosy Cross.” He is invited to remain with them for some time, and see how they live. His permanent residence with them is, however, objected to. The reasons given for it are as follow:— “There are still too many of the lower and animal elements adhering to your constitution.... They could not resist long the destructive influence of the pure and spiritual air of this place; and, as you have not yet a sufficient amount of truly spiritual elements in your organism to render it firm and strong, you would, by remaining here, soon become weak and waste away, like a person in consumption; you would become miserable instead of being happy, and you would die.” Then follows a philosophical conversation on WILL, in which the latter, in individual man, is said to become the stronger if it only uses the universal Will-Power in Nature, _itself remaining passive in the_ LAW. This sentence has to be well understood, lest it should lead the reader into the error of accepting pure _mediumistic passivity_ as the best thing for spiritual and occult development. A phenomenon is produced on a passing cloud, into which apparent life is infused by the Master’s hand, stretched towards it; this is again explained by showing that LIFE is universal and identical with WILL. Other phenomena still more wonderful follow; and they are all explained as being produced through natural laws, in which science will not believe. The thoughts of the student are read and answered as though his mind were an opened book. A lovely garden, full of exotic plants and luxurious palm-trees, into which he is taken, striking him as something unnatural in the Tyrolean Alps; so much luxury, moreover, seeming to him to disagree with the ascetic views just expressed by the adept, he is told forthwith, in answer to his unexpressed thoughts, that the garden had been erected to make his visit an agreeable one; and that it was an _illusion_. “All these trees and plants ... require no gardeners, ... they cost us nothing but an effort of our imagination”—he learns. “Surely,” he said, “this rose cannot be an illusion ... or an effect of my imagination?” “No,” answered the adept ... “but it is a product of the imagination of Nature, whose processes can be guided by the will of the adept. The whole world ... is nothing else but a world of the imagination of the _Universal Mind_, which is the _Creator_ of forms....”