JIMVILLE 



a certain indifference, blankness, emptiness 

 if you will, of all vaporings, no bubbling of 

 the pot, it wants the German to coin a 

 word for that, no bread-envy, no brother- 

 fervor. Western writers have not sensed 

 it yet; they smack the savor of lawlessness 

 too much upon their tongues, but you have 

 these to witness it is not mean-spiritedness. 

 It is pure Greek in that it represents the 

 courage to sheer off what is not worth while. 

 Beyond that it endures without sniveling, 

 renounces without self-pity, fears no death, 

 rates itself not too great in the scheme of 

 things ; so do beasts, so did St. Jerome in 

 the desert, so also in the elder day did gods. 

 Life, its performance, cessation, is no new 

 thing to gape and wonder at. 



Here you have the repose of the per- 

 fectly accepted instinct which includes pas- 

 sion and death in its perquisites. I suppose 

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