Pagina 38 van 490

"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He

does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural

passions. His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are

such things as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one

else's music, an actor of a part that has not been written for

him. The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature

perfectly-that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid

of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all

duties, the duty that one owes to one's self. Of course, they are

charitable. They feed the hungry and clothe the beggar. But their

own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our

race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society,

which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the

secret of religion-these are the two things that govern us. And

yet-"