THE MASTER-BUILDER 225 



absolute trust of any faculty which, like conscience, 

 has resulted from education. 



To cry injustice is only to say once more that 

 Nature can be cruel, according to man's notion. But 

 a familiar axiom of those who find in her the first 

 principle has always been that she is alike outside 

 of all right or wrong. She may no more be ap- 

 plauded for deliberate goodness than blamed for 

 premeditated evil. Nevertheless, the words " cruel " 

 and *' kind " are still hurled against her, for even 

 England's first living thinker, Herbert Spencer, 

 declares that Nature is a little cruel to be greatly 

 kind. 



She, indeed, holds the secret of all emotions, and 

 can bring each one to life ; yet, herself, she remains 

 emotionless, and above all creature-attributes of feel- 

 ing or of sense. Her wakening is love's awakening ; 

 her high noon reflects mankind's aspiration ; her 

 Autumn paints the pictures of thrift, generosity, and 

 motherhood ; and from her winter hours we gather 

 images, noble and pathetic, of human age. Ten thou- 

 sand times a day we go to her for similitudes and 

 figures that shall give life to speech ; in her we exist 

 mentally as well as physically ; from her all art draws 

 its life-blood, and often only pays her with cheap 

 sneers ; through her we first learned to conceive the 

 possibility of things greater than ourselves. But 

 man turns his back upon his Mother, because she 

 will whisper no fallacious word to him concerning 

 immortality. Her stern silence makes many hearts 

 Q 



