The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Allan Quatermain by H. Rider Haggard: orb as the presence of a visible and beneficent god, and he worships
it at its up-rising and down-setting. Then when still quite
small, he goes, holding fast to the pendent end of his mother's
'kaf' (toga), up to the temple of the Sun of the nearest city,
and there, when at midday the bright beams strike down upon the
golden central altar and beat back the fire that burns thereon,
he hears the white-robed priests raise their solemn chant of
praise and sees the people fall down to adore, and then, amidst
the blowing of the golden trumpets, watched the sacrifice thrown
into the fiery furnace beneath the altar. Here he comes again
to be declared 'a man' by the priests, and consecrated to war
 Allan Quatermain |