In no ruin of earth's youth giants' work now crumbling under the weight of time had I ever sensed a shadow of the strangeness with which this was instinct.

No--nor in the shattered fanes that once had held the gods of old Egypt, nor in the pillared shrines of Ancient Greece, nor Imperial Rome, nor mosque, basilica nor cathedral.
All these had been dedicated to gods which, whether created by humanity as science believes, or creators of humanity as their worshippers believed, still held in them that essence we term human.
The spirit, the force, that filled this place had in it nothing, NOTHING of the human.
No place?
Yes, there was one--Stonehenge.

Within that monolithic circle I had felt a something akin to this, as inhuman; a brooding spirit stony, stark, unyielding--as though not men but a people of stone had raised the great Menhirs.
This was a sanctuary built by a people of metal! It was filled with a soft yellow glow like pale sunshine.

Up from its floor arose hundreds of tremendous, square pillars down whose polished sides the crocus light seemed to flow.
Far, far as the gaze could reach, the columns marched, oppressively ordered, appallingly mathematical.

From their massiveness distilled a sense of power, mysterious, mechanical yet--living; something priestly, hierophantic--as though they were guardians of a shrine.
Now I saw whence came the light suffusing this place.