FIELD AND STUDY 



is shy of it, and many other things. But how it does 

 ripen the fruit and the grain ! How it brings us to 

 ourselves and the common-sense view of things! 

 how it favors our practical lives! how it grounds us 

 in real things! 



The best thing about the night is that it gives us 

 the stars; the best thing about the day is that it 

 gives us the earth and the sky — all the wealth of 

 color and aU the beauty of form; the bow in the 

 clouds, the clouds themselves, the lakes, the rivers, 

 the green earth, the lofty peaks. Night gives us in- 

 finity, it gives us the awful grandeur and mystery of 

 the heavens, but the day makes*us at home in the 

 earth and fosters the understanding. We love the 

 sunlit fields, but we stand in awe of the starlit 

 heavens. The middle ground, the twilight, favors 

 sentiment and memory and romance. Why is the 

 evening twilight more enticing than the morning 

 twilight? 



§ 

 How much more valuable is an instinct for the 

 truth than any one special gift or talent ! One sees 

 men of superior mental equipment who are yet 

 lacking in this instinct for the truth: that is, they 

 do not gravitate naturally, spontaneously, to that 

 which is true, as distinguished from that which is 

 merely plausible or specious or expedient. I was 

 thinking of this recently while reading Darwin. 

 How single his mind was! In debate most men are 

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