Stepping outside the story, above and beyond it, the protagonist becomes the narrator, explaining the stages of consciousness. He determines the theoretical prism through which the story is to be told. Upon return from this Otherworld, he tells us that intuitions and memories precede the realization of our physical sensations. The core of his message is that the spiritual reality precedes the physical in priority . Yet paradoxically it is through these later physical senses that memories of the spirit world come unbidden.
Remembrance is crucial but difficult when the consciousness rejoins sensation.
The protagonist recalls that after his swoon, he is escorted to the underworld by tall figures dressed in black, carrying him downward toward limitless silence and stillness - a domain whose memory threatens ordinary consciousness with madness. At this crucial point, the faculty of hearing jolts him to his senses. His mind, overwhelmed with sensation and feeling, now thinks about the trial, the judges and the sick swoon that overcame him.