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Murray Templeton was forty-five years old, in the prime of his life, and with all parts of his body in perfect working order except for certain key portions of his coronary arteries, but that was enough

The pain had come suddenly, had mounted to an unbearable peak, and had then ebbed steadily He could feel his breath slowing and a kind of gathering peace washing over him

There is no pleasure like the absence of pain - ih he were lifting in the air and hovering

He opened his eyes and noted with distant aitated He had been in the laboratory when the pain had struck, quite without warning, and when he had staggered, he had heard surprised outcries froony

Noith the pain gone, the others were still hovering, still anxious, still gathered about his fallen body - - Which, he suddenly realized, he was looking down on

He was down there, sprawled, face contorted He was up here, at peace and watching He thought: Miracle of ht

And although that was a hu way for an atheistic physicist to die, he felt only the mildest surprise, and no alteration of the peace in which he was iel - or so forDarkness was invading his consciousness and off in a distance, as a last gliuely huht: What a joke on ht that, the light faded, but the warh in all the Universe only he remained - and the Voice

The Voice said, "I have done this so often and yet I still have the capacity to be pleased at success"

It was in Murray&039;sa ue, or vocal cords Nevertheless, he tried to make a sound He tried, mouthlessly, to hum words or breathe the

And they canizable, and his oords, infinitely clear

Murray said, "Is this Heaven?"

The Voice said, "This is no place as you understand place"

Murray was embarrassed, but the next question had to be asked "Pardon me if I sound like a jackass Are you God?"

Without changing intonation or in any way ed to sound ae that I am always asked that in, of course, an infinite nuive that you would conificantly and you may cover that with any word or concept you please,"

Murray said, " And what am I? A soul? Or am I only personified existence too?" He tried not to sound sarcastic, but it seely, of adding a "Your Grace" or "Holy One" or so hih for the first ti punished for his insolence - or sin? - with Hell, and what that ht be like

The Voice did not sound offended "You are easy to explain - even to you You may call yourself a soul if that pleases you, but what you are is a nexus of electroed that all the interconnections and interrelationships are exactly imitative of those of your brain in your Universe - existence - down to the sht, your memories, your personality It still seems to you that you are you"

Murray found himself incredulous "You mean the essence of my brain was per about you that is permanent except what I choose to make so I formed the nexus I constructed it while you had physical existence and adjusted it to the moment when the existence failed"

The Voice seemed distinctly pleased with itself, and went on after a moment&039;s pause " An intricate but entirely precise construction I could, of course, do it for every hu in your world but I am pleased that I do not There is pleasure in the selection"

"You choose very few then"

"Very few"

"And what happens to the rest "

"Oblivion! Oh, of course, you iine a Hell"

Murray would have flushed if he had the capacity to do so He said, "I do not It is spoken of Still, I would scarcely have thought I was virtuous enough to have attracted your attention as one of the Elect"

"Virtuous? Ah, I see what yoush to perht, as I choose others, in quadrillions, froent species of the Universe"

Murray found himself suddenly curious, the habit of a lifetime He said, "Do you choose them all yourself or are there others like you?"

For a fleeting ht there was an impatient reaction to that, but when the Voice came, it was unmoved "Whether or not there are others is irrelevant to you This Universe is mine, and mine alone It is my invention, my construction, intended for my purpose alone"

"And yet with quadrillions of nexi you have formed, you spend time with me? Am I that important?"

The Voice said, "You are not important at all I am also with others in a hich, to your perception, would seem simultaneous"

"And yet you are one?"

Again amusement The Voice said, "You seek to trap me into an inconsistency If you were an amoeba who could consider individuality only in connection with single cells and if you were to ask a sperm whale, made up of thirty quadrillion cells, whether it was one or many, how could the sperm whale answer in a way that would be comprehensible to the amoeba?"

Murray said dryly, "I&039;ll think about it It may become comprehensible"

"Exactly That is your function You will think"

"To what end? You already know everything, I suppose"

The Voice said, "Even if I knew everything, I could not know that I know everything"

Murray said, "That sounds like a bit of Eastern philosophy - so that sounds profound precisely because it has no "

The Voice said, "You have promise You answer my paradox with a paradox - except that mine is not a paradox Consider I have existed eternally, but what does thatcome into existence If I could, I would not have existed eternally If I cannot re co - the nature ofinto existence - that I do not know

"Then, too, although what I know is infinite, it is also true that what there is to know is infinite, and how can I be sure that both infinities are equal? The infinity of potential knowledge reater than the infinity of e Here is a siers, I would know an infinite nule odd integer"

Murray said, "But the odd integers can be derived If you divide every even integer in the entire infinite series by two, you will get another infinite series which will contain within it the infinite series of odd integers"

The Voice said, "You have the idea I am pleased It will be your task to find other such ways, far more difficult ones, from the known to the not-yet-known You have your memories You will remember all the data you have ever collected or learned, or that you have or will deduce from that data If necessary, you will be allowed to learn what additional data you will consider relevant to the problems you set yourself"

"Could you not do all that for yourself?"

The Voice said, "I can, but it isthis way I constructed the Universe in order to have more facts to deal with I inserted the uncertainty principle, entropy, and other randomization factors to make the whole not instantly obvious It has worked well for it has ahout its entire existence