Japhra said: "So we come to it--and to thee. Truly there are two things: life which is here in the green leaf, and gone in the dry; and the spirit which goeth God knows where--into the sea that ever moves, the wind that ever blows, the sap that ever rises--who shall say? But knoweth not death and haply endureth forever if it were mighty enough--as Milton, as Bunyan. Look at me, master, for that is the plain fact of it and the balsam for all thy hurts." He stopped and drew slowly at his pipe with little puffs that floated to Percival like grey thistledown dropping through the night. "Go on," Percival said. "Go on, Japhra." "Why, there thou hast it," Japhra told him. "Lay hold on thy spirit--let that be thy charge; and of what cometh against thee take no heed save to rebuke it as a boxer rebuketh the cunning of him that is matched against him. So was the way of Crusoe, of old Bunyan's Pilgrim, and of the Bible men, and that is why I call them the books for a fighting man. Here's my way of it, master--there's force in the world that moves the tides and blows the winds and maketh the green things grow. Out of that force I unriddle it we come, and back to it return. In some the spirit is utterly swallowed up in life, and at death crawleth back suffocated and befouled and only fit to come again in some rank growth--so much a lesser thing than when it came springing to a human breast that the force of the world whence it came is by so much lessened and can give birth to a flower less and a toadstool more." "And then there's the other way about," said Percival, attracted by this argument. "Ay, truly the other way about, master. The way of the mighty men in whom the spirit rebuketh life and increaseth, and at death goeth shouting back--so quickening the force of the world that, just as the cup spilleth when much is added, so there be mighty storms when great men die--thunders and rushing winds, great lightnings and vast seas." Percival drew a long breath. "Why, it's a fine idea, Japhra--fine." "Look at a case of it," Japhra said. "My Bible in the van there hath one. I have it by heart. Look when Christ died. Never a man than He cared less how life tasked Him; and at His death--when there went shouting back the spirit that He had increased beyond the increase of any man--look thou what came: 'And behold the veil of the Temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth quaked; and the rocks rent and the graves were opened.' And again: 'And it was about the sixth hour; and there was darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour; and the sun was darkened.'" He stopped; and Percival breathed long and deep again: "Fine, Japhra--fine. I never thought of it like that. Fine--I think I see."