The importance attached to the occult significance of our "tinctures" received illustration in this wise. Permission had been given us to make an exception to the rule of secrecy imposed with regard to certain of the Scriptures received by us, in favour of a friend[59] who took so warm an interest in our work as to be eager to render it material aid in the future should occasion arise. It was her mission, she declared, to do so. But when the day appointed for the reading came, "Mary" was so ill that her going seemed to be impossible, and the question accordingly arose as to whether I might go alone and read them without her. We had no sooner begun to consider the point than she became entranced, and was shown a large open volume, the book of the Greater Mysteries to which our Scriptures belonged, surrounded by an Iris composed of all the colours of the rainbow. She was then shown the following lines, which I wrote down as she repeated them:-- "The one in Red guards his privileges, and claims to be present whatever is read. For the air is filled with the haters of the Mysteries. Therefore for your sake the chain must be complete; And the Light must be refracted round you seven times. He who is Red stands within the holy circle. And the Violet guards the outermost. For the Word is a Word of Mystery, and they who guard it are Seven. Beware that nothing you hear be told unless the circle be perfect. And this charge we lay upon you until the work be accomplished. Fire and sword and war are against you; you walk in the midst of commotion. And your life is in peril every hour until the words be completed." Up to the latest moment of the interval before the appointment it seemed impossible for her to go. She then suddenly recovered as by miracle, and was able to attend the reading. The liabilities of our position subsequently[60] received this further illustration. "Mary" was introduced in sleep, by her Genius, into an apartment in the spiritual world which purported to be the laboratory of William Lilly, the famous astrologer who had foretold the great plague and fire of London in 1666, in order to have her horoscope told by him, he still pursuing his favourite studies. On quitting him she caught sight of a pile of books, one of which contained the Gnosis we were in course of recovering. The following colloquy then ensued:-- "You also have these Scriptures!" she exclaimed. "Yes," said he, "but I keep them for myself alone." "And why so," she asked, "since, if you have them, they are for the learning of others likewise? Will you not rather communicate these saving truths to thirsty souls?" "I will communicate them," said he, fixing his eyes on her intently, "when I can find Seven Men who for forty days have tasted no flesh, whose hands have shed no blood, and whose tongues have tasted of none." "But if you find not Seven?" "Then, mayhap, I shall find Five."