With every day, and from both sides of my intelligence, the
moral and the intellectual, I thus drew steadily nearer to
that truth, by whose partial discovery I have been doomed
to such a dreadful shipwreck: that man is not truly one,
but truly two.
*
It may be argued again that dissatisfaction with our life's
endeavour springs in some degree from dulness. We require
higher tasks because we do not recognise the height of
those we have. Trying to be kind and honest seems an
affair too simple and too inconsequential for gentlemen of
our heroic mould; we had rather set ourselves something
bold, arduous, and conclusive; we had rather found a schism
or suppress a heresy, cut off a hand or mortify an
appetite. But the task before us, which is to co-endure
with our existence, is rather one of microscopic fineness,
and the heroism required is that of patience. There is no
cutting of the Gordian knots of life; each must be
smilingly unravelled.
*
It is perhaps a more fortunate destiny to have a taste for
collecting shells than to be born a millionaire. Although
neither is to be despised, it is always better policy to
learn an interest than to make a thousand pounds; for the
money will soon be spent, or perhaps you may feel no joy in
spending it; but the interest remains imperishable and ever
new. To become a botanist, a geologist, a social
philosopher, an antiquary, or an artist, is to enlarge
one's possessions in the universe by an incalculably higher
degree, and by a far surer sort of property, than to
purchase a farm of many acres.
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