What McTaggart wrote was different. He argued that 'Even the best men are not, when they die, in such a state of intellectual and moral perfection as would fit them to enter heaven immediately. This is generally recognized, and one of two alternatives is commonly adopted to meet it. The first is that some tremendous improvement -an improvement out of all proportion to any which can ever be observed in life- takes place at the moment of death. The second is that the process of gradual improvement goes on in each of us after the death of our present bodies.

'If this second more probable alternative is true, then we have to contend with a plurality of lives instead of a single one. And a plurality of lives must mean at least three; the present one, the one before it and the one after it, though it is more likely that there would be a series of past lives.'

He supported his plurality of lives/pre-existence argument by explaining innate skills or propensities as skills known or practiced in an earlier life and that a man's character is directly shaped by the unremembered experiences of these previous lives.

I laid back on the bed, held the book close to me and relished the comradery and vindication in its pages. The storm had eased, but by the time I'd finished, I was too excited to sleep. I felt like running down and camping in front of the library until it opened so I could comb the stacks for the related titles I'd found. Taking an apple from the basket, I looked at my bandaged foot. 'I won't be running anywhere for a while.'

It felt claustrophobic in my room and I decided to continue reading in the main nave. There had to be a way to walk quietly so that I wouldn't disturb my white-haired watchdog across the way. My eyes scanned the room several times until they stopped on the pillows. I slipped the pillow cases off and folded one several times until it was about eight inches square, then placed it inside the other case so that it sat perfectly in the bottom. I placed the leg of the crutch inside the pillowcase so that it rested on the maximum number of folds. I grabbed McTaggart, John Donne, and the muffled crutch and prepared to make a straight shot for the near pew, keeping a firm hold on the end of the pillowcase sleeve around the leg of the crutch. It worked perfectly.

I hobbled silently to the pew and carefully settled in to read. The type on the pages was barely visible in the poor light. Dawn was breaking outside. I had read all night.