"
"If he discerns his lack," said my teacher with a smile, "he is probably
not so very far from the truth. The germ of the sense of moral beauty is
there, and it only wants patience and endeavour to make it grow. But it
cannot be all done in any single life, of course; that is where the
human faith fails, in its limitations of a man's possibilities to a
single life."
"But what is the reason," I said, "why the morality, the high austerity
of some persons, who are indubitably high-minded and pure-hearted, is so
utterly discouraging and even repellent?"
"Ah," he said, "there you touch on a great truth. The reason of that is
that these have but a sterile sort of connoisseur-ship in virtue. Virtue
cannot be attained in solitude, nor can it be made a matter of private
enjoyment. The point is, of course, that it is not enough for a man to
be himself; he must also give himself; and if a man is moral because of
the delicate pleasure it brings him--and the artistic pleasure of
asceticism is a very high one--he is apt to find himself here in very
strange and distasteful company. In this, as in everything, the only
safe motive is the motive of love.
Pages:
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228