381. The second Memorable Relation:
When looking around in the world of spirits, I once saw in the distance a palace, surrounded and, as it were, besieged by a great crowd; I also saw many men running towards it. Astonished at this, I hastily left home and asked one of the runners what was going on there. He replied that three new-comers from the world had been taken up into a heaven and had there seen magnificent things and also maidens and wives of wondrous beauty. When let down from that heaven, they had gone into this palace and told what they had seen, especially that they had seen beauties such as their eyes had never seen nor can see unless enlightened by the light of the aura of heaven. As to themselves, they had said that in the world they had been orators from the kingdom of France, and had devoted themselves to the cultivation of eloquence, and that now a desire to deliver an oration on the origin of beauty had come upon them. This had been made known in the neighborhood, and in consequence a great crowd had flocked in to hear them.
Hearing this, I also hastened thither, and entering in I saw the three men standing in the center. They were clothed with robes of a sapphire color, and at every turn they made, their robes, from the golden threads inwoven in them, shone as though they were all gold. They stood behind a sort of pulpit, ready to speak. Presently one of them stood up on the step behind the pulpit to deliver his oration on the origin of beauty in the female sex. He then put forth the following: