NATURE IN THE LOUVRE. 265, 
all care, and to make this life scem the life of the im- 
mortals. 
Returning the next morning, my thoughts went on, 
and found that this ideal of nature required of us some- 
thing beyond good. The conception of moral good did 
not satisfy one while contemplating it. The highest form 
known to us at present is pure unselfishness, the doing’ 
of good, not for any reward, now or hereafter, nor for the 
completion of animaginary scheme. This is the best we 
know. But how unsatisfactory! Filled with the aspira- 
tions called forth by the ideal before me, it appeared as 
if even the saving of life is a little work compared to what 
the heart would like to do. An outlet is needed more 
fully satisfying to its inmost desires than is afforded by 
any labour of self-abnegation. It must be something 
in accord with the perception of beauty and of an ideal. 
Personal virtue is not enough. The works called good 
are dry and jejune, soon consummated, often of question- 
able value, and leaving behind them when finished a sense 
of vacuity. You give a sum of money to a good object 
and walk away, but it does not satisfy the craving of the 
heart. You deny yourself pleasure to sit by the bedside 
of an invalid—a good deed ; but when it is done there 
remains an emptiness of the soul. It is not enough—it 
is casuistry to say that itis. I often think the reason 
the world is so cold and selfish, so stolid and indifferent, 
is because it has never yet been shown how to be any- 
thing else. Listening to the prophets of all times and 
climes, it has heard them proclaim their ordinances, and 
has seen these observances punctually obeyed for hun- 
dreds of years, and nothing has come of it all. To-day 
it listens to the prophets of humanity, and it sees much 
real benevolence actually carried out. But the result is 
infinitesimal. ‘Nothing comes of it; it does not satisfy 
