The priest-fool yonder with his new faith, has spoken blundering words of judgment and damnation which, though I do not believe them, yet stick in my heart like arrows.

I will stamp out his faith, and with this ancient sword of thine drive back the new gods into the darkness whence they came.

Yet what if some water of Truth flows through the channel of his leaden lips, and what if because I have ruled and will rule as thou didst decree, therefore, in some dim place of souls, I must bear these burdens of terror and of doom which I have bound upon the backs of others! Nay, it cannot be, for what power is there in all the universe that dares to make a slave of Oro and to afflict him with stripes?
"Yet this can be and mayhap will be, that presently I lose my path in the ways of everlasting darkness, and become strengthless and forgotten as are those who went before me, while my crown of Power shines on younger brows.

Alas! I grow old, since aeons of sleep have not renewed my strength.

My time is short and yet I would not die as mortals must.
Oh! God of my people, whom I have served so well, save me from the death I dread.