I have no wish to be unfair to the Reverend John. He was a fanatic; and no fanatic is entirely sane. I am sure, also, that in the earlier stages of his campaign he strove merely for the spiritual good of the people as he understood it. But it is necessary to say also that I believe he became crazed in the end; and that the ultimate effect of his preaching led us to the very edge of disaster. It is not for me to weigh or judge him; he preferred his visions to material safety; whilst my own mind is concerned more with the things of this earth than with what may come later. His preaching now passed into a stage where even I could appreciate its dangerous character. More and more, his sermons took the form of belittlings of the material world; while the joys of eternal life were held up in comparison. It was not long until he was openly questioning whether our human existence was worth prolonging at all. Would it not be better, he asked, to throw off these shackles of the Flesh at once rather than live for a few years longer amid the sorrows and temptations of this world? Why not discard this earthly mantle and enter at once into Nirvana? This appeared to me a mere preaching of suicide; but if his followers chose to adopt his suggestions, it seemed to me a matter for themselves. I had always regarded suicide as the back-door out of life; though I had never under-estimated the courage of those who turn its handle. Yet it seemed to me evidence of a certain want of toughness of fibre, a lack of fitness to survive; and, personally, I had no desire to retain in the world anyone who seemed unable to bear its strains. His next phase of development, however, opened my eyes. By this time he had become a great power among the people. Many a king has been treated with less reverence than his followers showed to him. Crowds flocked to his meetings, standing thickly even when they stretched far beyond the reach of that magnificent voice. In the streets he was saluted as though he were a superhuman agent. There were attempts made to get him to touch the sick in the hope that he might heal them. From afar, Nordenholt watched all this rising surge of emotion. In some ways, the two men resembled each other; but their motives were wide apart as the Poles. Both had their ideals, higher than the normal; but these ideals were in deadly antagonism to each other. Both, it is possible, were right; but the clash of right with right is the highest form of tragedy; and collision between them was inevitable.