NEW GLEANINGS IN FIELD AND WOOD 



more an end than is the rising vapor. Each is a 

 part of the great circuit of beneficent and malevo- 

 lent forces upon which our life (and all life) de- 

 pends, upon which the making of the soil of the 

 earth and the shaping of the landscape depend; 

 all vegetable and animal life, all the bloom and 

 perfume of the world, all the glory of cloud and 

 sky, all the hazards of flood and storm, all the ter- 

 ror of torrents and inundations, are in this circuit 

 of the waters from the sea to the sky, and back 

 again through the rivers to the sea. In our geologic 

 time there is, in this circuit of the waters, more that 

 favors life than hinders it, else, as I so often say, 

 we should not be here. The enormous destruction 

 of human life, of all life, which has taken place and 

 will continue to take place, in this beneficent cir- 

 cuit, is only an incident in the history of the globe; 

 the physical forces are neither for nor against it; 

 they are neutral; life to be here at all has to run 

 these risks; has to run the gantlet of these forces, 

 and to get many a lash and gash in the running. 

 Against the suffering and death incident thereto 

 there is no insurance save in the wit of man him- 

 self. All this wit has been developed and sharpened 

 by much waste and suffering. We learn to deal 

 with difficulties through the discipline of the diffi- 

 culties themselves. If man were finally to learn to 

 control the rains and the floods, it would be through 

 the experience which they themselves bring him. 



215 



