Essays on Life 



trace of the body has disappeared ; we see 

 them doing it in the bodies and memories of 

 those that come after them ; and not a few 

 live so much longer and more effectually than 

 is desirable, that it has been necessary to get 

 rid of them by Act of Parliament. It is love 

 that alone gives life, and the truest life is 

 that which we live not in ourselves but vica- 

 riously in others, and with which we have 

 no concern. Our concern is so to order our- 

 selves that we may be of the number of them 

 that enter into life although we know it 

 not. 



JEschylus did so order himself ; but his 

 life is not of that inspiriting kind that can be 

 won through fighting the good fight only 

 or being believed to have fought it. His 

 voice is the echo of a drone, drone-begotten 

 and drone-sustained. It is not a tone that a 

 man must utter or die nay, even though he 

 die ; and likely enough half the allusions and 

 hard passages in ^Eschylus of which we can 

 make neither head nor tail are in reality only 

 puffs of some of the literary leaders of his 



time, 



36 



