Over my lifetime, I have experienced values outside of the system of the
gods of the East. I did so furtively, taking care not to admit it even
to myself.

I experienced the value of suffering and of self-mortification.
Experiencing the opposite of pleasure does not in itself produce
pleasure, but it produces a deepened sense of a particular reality: that
the world does not conform to our fondest wishes and never will.

To exist in the tumult of history, to give equal credence to things of
beauty and of terror, is what I now must do. To accept that there exists
no pleasure without an opposite in pain, no good deed without a
malevolent mirror image, no joy and life without terror and death, and
yet to be driven by the imperative of flesh to go on--this is what I
seek. Perhaps this is what those called Evil refer to as strength.

Therefore I will submit myself to the certain torments of Mhaldor.
Having experienced every form of Goodness I must now submit myself to
all opposites. Every pain I endure will obliterate some pleasure from my
long life in the walled garden of Shallam and in the cloisters of the
Basilica. On some future day, nothing will be left to me: I will be
emptied of every thing, and I will still be alive. That will be the day
of my victory over myself.

To all those who have been my good friends over the decades: when I call
down lightning from heaven to assail you, regard it in the same spirit
in which you received my blessing during the days when I was Imithian
Prelate. Perhaps you will come to feel as I do that your joys provide no
recourse to your pains. Perhaps you will dress yourselves in sack-cloth
and follow me out of the gates.

Never forgive me,
Magus Azor Corso

Penned by my hand on the 11th of Phaestian, in the year 541 AF.