THE NUPTIAL FLIGHT 169 



the race, though manifestly inferior to the morality that 

 could be conceived or desired by the minds composing the 

 small and the clearer wave that ascends the other. And yet, 

 can such a mind be wrong if it ask itself whether the whole 

 truth — moral truths, therefore, as well as non-moral — had not 

 better be sought in this chaos than in itself, where these truths 

 would seem comparatively clear and precise ? 



The man who feels thus will never attempt to deny the 

 reason or virtue of his ideal, hallowed by so many heroes and 

 sages ; but there are times when he will whisper to himself 

 that this ideal, perhaps, has been formed at too great a dis- 

 tance from the enormous mass whose diverse beauty it would 

 fain represent. He has hitherto legitimately feared that the 

 attempt to adapt his morality to that of Nature would risk 

 the destruction of what was her masterpiece. But to-day he 

 understands her a little better ; and from some of her replies, 

 which, though still vague, reveal an unexpected breadth, he 

 has been enabled to seize a glimpse of a plan and an intellect 

 vaster than could be conceived by his unaided imagination ; 

 wherefore he has grown less afraid, nor feels any longer the 

 same imperious need of the refuge his own special virtue 

 and reason afford him. He concludes that what is so great 

 could surely teach nothing that would tend to lessen itself. 

 He wonders whether the moment may not have arrived for 

 submitting to a more judicious examination his convictions, 

 his principles, and his dreams. 



Once more, he has not the sHghtest desire to abandon 

 his human ideal. That even which at first diverts him from 

 this ideal teaches him to return to it. It were impossible 

 for Nature to give ill advice to a man who declines to 



