NEWS OF SPRING 



found therein; and some of these glimmers are conveyed to 

 us by the insects and the flowers. 



29 



We have long taken a rather foolish pride in thinking 

 ourselves miraculous, unparalleled and marvellously fortui- 

 tous beings, probably coming from another world, having no 

 definite ties with the rest of life and, in any case, endowed 

 with an unusual, incomparable, monstrous aptitude. It is 

 greatly preferable to be less prodigious, for we have learnt 

 that prodigies do not take long to disappear in the normal 

 evolution of nature. It is much more comforting to observe 

 that we follow the same road as the soul of this great world, 

 that we have the same ideas, the same hopes, the same trials 

 and — were it not for our specific dream of justice and pity — 

 the same feelings. It is much more consoling to assure our- 

 selves that, to better our lot, to utilize the forces, the occa- 

 sions, the laws of matter, we employ methods exactly similar 

 to those which it uses to enlighten and sway its unconscious 

 and unruly regions, that there are no other methods, that we 

 are in the right and that we are in our proper place and at 

 home in this universe formed of unknown substances, whose 



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