“To feel alone in a free, merciless world with only one’s strength to rely on; engaged in intimate dialogue with the deepest and most mysterious forces of one’s being; awakened to pure, harsh dimensions that almost enable us to partake of that same transcendence over and indifference toward the human domain that in the majestic and shining peaks seem to find their best symbolic representation.”

Julius Evola

Yes, it was the Summer holidays and my annual few days of sanity away from work and the family. Little did I know that I’d return with a new spirit of hope! My trip into the “merciless world” began in Carlisle on the Hadrian’s Wall path.

“In the struggle against mountain heights, action is finally free from all machines, and from everything that detracts from man’s direct and absolute relationship with things.”

Not quite! The train came into Carlisle but the trail began to the west of the city. It being me, as usual I began walking in totally the wrong direction i.e. West to the sea and the start of the wall.

“Up close to the sky and to crevasses-among the still and silent greatness of the peaks; in the impetuous raging winds and snowstorms; among the dazzling brightness of glaciers; or among the fierce, hopeless verticality of rock faces-it is possible to reawaken (through what may at fIrst appear to be the mere employment of the body) the symbol of overcoming, a truly spiritual and virile light, and make contact with primordial forces locked within the body’s limbs.”

“In this way the climber’s struggle will be more than physical and the successful climb, may come to represent the achievement of something that is no longer merely human. In ancient mythologies the mountain peaks were regarded as the seats of the gods; this is myth, but it is also the allegorical expression of a real belief that may always come alive again sub specie interioritatis.”

Well old Julius must have had something there because on approaching Brocolitia and the temple of Mithras….

This happened….

Anything that happened after that was an anticlimax! Should I take up a new religion? Are there any true believers left. Mithras was the Roman soldiers’ favourite of course. How does one worship a Sun God in rainy old Britain???? I left there very un- nerved.

Well I’d done it! The walk was a memorable experience and I would recommend it to anyone! You do need to be well prepared for the weather. I went, perhaps fittingly, in August and wind and rain can be expected! The wall is a sublime piece of living history. Others can argue about whether it was porous or a barrier, all I can say is that it makes one feel very humble that the Ancients could achieve so much lasting accomplishments. Maybe Mithras was helping them too?

MB. August 2023