"But you just now said there was but one mind."

"Perhaps then it would be more correct to say, from my point of
consciousness to yours; or, to be still more accurate, to say that
the intensity of my thoughts struck a sympathetic chord in yours, and
vibrated through you as one consciousness. Without undue familiarity,
Mr. Henley, I have found in you a responsive temperament. There are
few men I can not influence, and with some the effort is trifling."

Paul was interested, and sat quietly reflecting upon what he had
heard. Naturally the ideas were not so clear as they would have been
had he given more thought to the conditions of spirituality, which
for so many years had been a part of Ah Ben's existence, and which
state was as familiar to him as the body in which he appeared. Time
and reflection alone, as this strange man had declared, could bring
one to comprehend and realize a condition of existence so totally
differing from that of our material plane. The inability of language
to express that of which we have no parallel, and of which we can not
conceive, is a grave obstacle to our understanding; but the man was
ever ready to exert himself to make the matter clear when he found
his listener interested.

"If I am not tiring you," continued Paul, "I should like to call your
attention to another point. You said that nothing was absolute; that
all was relative; and yet when it comes to fixed measures, I think
you must admit that this is not so. For example, a mile is a mile,
and a mile must always be a mile under every conceivable condition.
Am I not right?"