“… the third of Lord Asriel’s high commanders, an angel by the name of Xaphania.”

She was tall, naked, winged, and her lined face was older than that of any living creature Mrs. Coulter had ever seen. “Are you one of the angels who rebelled so long ago?” “Yes. And since then I have been wandering between many worlds. Now I have pledged my allegiance to Lord Asriel, because I see in his great enterprise the best hope of destroying the tyranny at last.” “But if you fail?” “Then we shall all be destroyed, and cruelty will reign forever.”

“I was flying high,” she (Serafina) explained, “looking for a landfall, and I met an angel: a female angel. She was very strange; she was old and young together,” she went on, forgetting that that was how she herself appeared to Mary. “Her name was Xaphania. She told me many things … She said that all the history of human life has been a struggle between wisdom and stupidity. She and the rebel angels, the followers of wisdom, have always tried to open minds; the Authority and his churches have always tried to keep them closed. She gave me many examples from my world.” “I can think of many from mine.” “And for most of that time, wisdom has had to work in secret, whispering her words, moving like a spy through the humble places of the world while the courts and palaces are occupied by her enemies.”