The Life of the Bee 
each other, and to persist in their pres- 
ent mediocrity; but thus does it often 
happen in nature. The gifts she accords 
are employed for evil at first, for the ren- 
dering worse what she had apparently 
sought to improve; but, from this evil, a 
certain good will always result in the end. 
Besides, J am by no means anxious to 
prove that there has been progress, which 
may be a very small thing or a very great 
thing, according to the place whence we 
regard it. It is a vast achievement, the 
surest ideal, perhaps, to render the condi- 
tion of men a little less servile, a little less 
painful; but let the mind detach itself for 
an instant from material results, and the 
difference between the man who marches 
in the van of progress and the other 
who is blindly dragged at its tail ceases 
to be very considerable. Among these 
young rustics, whose mind is haunted 
only by formless ideas, there are many 
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