But when they reach me, I can make the writing appear and stand out on these apparently unsullied pages as distinctly as though your words had been printed. My letters to you will also, when you receive them, appear blank; but you will only have to press them for about ten minutes in this"--and he handed me what looked like an ordinary blotting-book--"and they will be perfectly legible. Cellini has these little writing implements; he uses them whenever the distances are too great for us to amuse ourselves with the sagacity of Leo--in fact the journeys of that faithful animal have principally been to keep him in training."
"But," I said, as I took the pencil and book from his hand, "why do you not make these convenient writing materials public property? They would be so useful."
"Why should I build up a fortune for some needy stationer?" he asked, with a half-smile. "Besides, they are not new things. They were known to the ancients, and many secret letters, laws, histories, and poems were written with instruments such as these. In an old library, destroyed more than two centuries ago, there was a goodly pile of apparently blank parchment. Had I lived then and known what I know now, I could have made the white pages declare their mystery."
"Has this also to do with electricity?" I asked.
"Certainly--with what is called vegetable electricity. There is not a plant or herb in existence, but has almost a miracle hidden away in its tiny cup or spreading leaves--do you doubt it?"
"Not I!" I answered quickly. "I doubt nothing!"
Heliobas smiled gravely.
"You are right!" he said. "Doubt is the destroyer of beauty--the poison in the sweet cup of existence--the curse which mankind have brought on themselves. Avoid it as you would the plague. Believe in anything or everything miraculous and glorious--the utmost reach of your faith can with difficulty grasp the majestic reality and perfection of everything you can see, desire, or imagine. Mistrust that volatile thing called Human Reason, which is merely a name for whatever opinion we happen to adopt for the time--it is a thing which totters on its throne in a fit of rage or despair--there is nothing infinite about it. Guide yourself by the delicate Spiritual Instinct within you, which tells you that with God all things are possible, save that He cannot destroy Himself or lessen by one spark the fiery brilliancy of his ever-widening circle of productive Intelligence. But make no attempt to convert the world to your way of thinking--it would be mere waste of time."