Excerpt from Outlines: A Collection of Brief Imaginative Studies Related to Many Phases of Thought, and Representing an Effort to Give an Interpretation to Familiar Human Experiences The name of the studies I chose because it suggested what, in writing them, I had tried to do. They might easily have been amplified into stories much longer. And yet, I liked to think that, in their brevity, they carried their meaning with clearness. If the reader wished he might fill out the outlines for himself, with, possibly, more satis faction than if the work had been done for him. Obviously, to the reasonably careful reader, the mean ing of an allegory or of any imaginative work, ought to be plain. If, in any instance here, the meaning invites ques tion or causes bewilderment the fault is mine. On first publication The Wife of the Prophet led to so astonish ing a misconception on the part of a few readers that I might have thought of rewriting it if, to other readers, the intention had not been clear. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.