LOVE AT THE HEART 169 



men are consuming with affection for one another 

 and only longing for opportunity to exert that affec- 

 tion. They want to behave straightly, honourably, 

 and in a neighbourly fashion towards one another, 

 and are only too thankful when means and condi- 

 tions can be found which will let them indulge this 

 inborn feeling of fellowship. Wickedness, of 

 course, exists. But wickedness is not the essential 

 characteristic of men. It is due to ignorance, 

 immaturity, and neglect, like the naughtinesses of 

 children. It springs from the conditions in which 

 men find themselves, and not from any radical in- 

 clination within themselves. With maturity and 

 reasonable conditions the innate goodness which is 

 the essential characteristic will assert itself. This 

 is what came to me with burning conviction. And 

 it arose from no ephemeral sense of exhilaration, 

 nor has it since evaporated away. It has remained 

 with me for fifteen years, and so I suppose will 

 last for the rest of my life. Of course in a sense 

 there has been disillusionment, both as to myself 

 and as to the world. As one comes into the dull 

 round of everyday life the glow fades away and all 

 seems grey and colourless. Nevertheless, the con- 

 viction remains that the glow was the real, and that 

 the grey is the superficial. The glow was at the 

 heart and is what some day will be — or, anyhow, 

 might be. 



An additional ground I have for believing it to 

 be true is that on that mountain-side near Lhasa I 

 had a specially favourable opportunity of looking at 

 the world from, as it were, a proper focal distance. 

 And it is only from a proper focal distance that we 



