mental effort to recall the reason. That was it! He had decided to go down and sleep, because one sure of the kingdom of heaven has no need of prayer. Then, like the lightning flashing round him, came a flash within him:
"I am tempting God!"
The serpents pressed him tighter; the demon crept towards him on all fours, up the rocky slope, all hellishly alive with fierce spirits; the black flames burst forth in the openings of the great tower, the abyss the while howling, triumphant! Then the sovereign roar of the thunder rumbled through the clouds: "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!" Benedetto raised his face and his clasped hands towards heaven, worshipping as best he might with the last glimmer of clouded consciousness. He swayed, spread wide his arms, clutching the air. Slowly he bent backwards, fell prostrate upon his back on the hillside, and then lay motionless.
His body, motionless midst the rush of the thunderstorm, lay like an uprooted trunk, among the straining gorse and the waving grass. His soul must have been sealed by the central contact with the Being without time and without space, for when Benedetto first regained consciousness he had lost all sense of place and of time. His limbs felt strangely light; he experienced a pleasant sensation of physical exhaustion, and his heart was flooded with infinite sweetness. First
