THE SAGA IN A PARAGRAPH

 

The Hero With a Thousand Faces 

Joseph Campbell  

Third Edition 

Page 5

The unconscious sends all sorts of vapors, odd beings,

terrors, and deluding images up into the mind -

 

whether in dream, broad daylight, or insanity;

for the human kingdom,

beneath the floor of the comparatively neat

little dwelling that we call our consciousness,

  

goes down into unsuspected Aladdin caves.

There not only jewels

but also dangerous jinn abide:

the inconvenient or resisted psychological powers that 

we have not thought or dared to integrate into our lives.

And they may remain unsuspected,

or, on the other hand, some chance word, 

the smell of a landscape, 

the taste of a cup of tea,

or the glance of an eye may 

touch a magic spring,

and then dangerous messengers 

begin to appear in the brain.

These are dangerous because they 

threaten the fabric of the security

into which we have built ourselves and our family.

But they are fiendishly fascinating 

too, for they carry keys

that open the whole realm of the 

desired and feared adventure of

the discovery of the self.

 Destruction of the world that we 

have built and in which we live,

and of ourselves within it;

but then a wonderful reconstruction

of the bolder, cleaner, more 

spacious, and fully human life -

that is the lure,

the promise

and the terror,

of these disturbing night visitants from the 

mythological realm that we carry within.

The End