BEAUTY AND THE ELECTIVE AFFINITIES 173 



succeed in finding a tenable situation for the two 

 lovers instinctively drawn to each other, but sepa- 

 rated by the barrier of a luckless marriage. Julie 

 overcomes temptation up to a certain point, but just 

 as the experiment in which she figures is about to 

 fail she is conveniently engulfed in the waters of 

 the Lake of Geneva, 



With the morality of such questions we have 

 nothing to do. Morality is a matter of social 

 discipline ; it is not an inherent principle in nature 

 like the law of gravitation, but is a sort of under- 

 standing arrived at by nations or communities for 

 the better regulation of their affairs. It would 

 obviously be impossible for a man to commit any 

 moral offence whatever if he happened to be the 

 solitary inhabitant of a desert island, and where 

 numbers of men are gathered together they have the 

 right to agree among themselves as to what things 

 may or may not be done — in other words, to erect a 

 standard of morality adapted to their needs. Thus 

 in an advanced condition of society thieving is a 

 breach of a conventional regulation, but when two 

 nations go to war they waive their understanding 

 with each other upon this point, and the annexation 

 by one of them of a slice of the other's territory 



