224 MY DEVON YEAR 



elusions are neither founded upon study nor experi- 

 ence ; they have not touched and seen ; they have 

 not scorched for it and sweated for it, drenched for 

 it and frozen for it. They have looked at Nature out 

 of a window ; they have arrived at their conclusions 

 by data gathered in railway trains while journeying 

 from one intellectual centre to another. They never 

 shared the life of the leaves and the boughs and the 

 birds. They never lived alone with the earth. They 

 never felt Nature touch their hearts to patience, lift 

 their unrest, purify the foul places of their minds, call 

 them clear- voiced to braver life and more courageous 

 thinking. 



All, indeed, cannot so feel this influence ; all are not 

 constituted that they can endure it; the greater number 

 ask for something more hopeful, and demand a promise 

 of a happier life in a happier world than this is. Let 

 such go their way, but let them not lift their voices 

 against the earth-cult ; for they neither know its reality 

 nor apprehend its meaning. There is a cry of Nature's 

 fatalism and pessimism ; there is an assurance that she 

 is illusive, a pageant of the senses, a dream-picture 

 thrown on dust to vanish with the wind. Those who 

 believe this will add that the meaning of natural facts 

 is often hidden from us, and that they shall be found 

 productive of much injustice from the standpoint of 

 human conscience. It never occurs to these misty 

 thinkers that conscience should be distrusted in this 

 and other matters; yet there is a deadly danger in 



