* * * * *

And yet, in the very moment of his discouragement and of his blackest vision of things, that man knows quite well that he will go on striving.  He knows that his instinct to strive will be stronger than his genuine conviction that the desired end cannot be achieved.  Positive though he may be that a worldly ambition realised will produce the same dissatisfaction as Dead Sea fruit in the mouth, he will still continue to struggle. * * * Now you cannot argue against facts, and this is a fact.  It must be accepted.  Conduct must be adjusted to it.  The struggle being inevitable, it must be carried through as well as it can be carried through.  It will not end brilliantly, but precautions can be taken against it ending disgracefully.  These precautions consist in the devising of a plan of campaign, and the plan of campaign is defined by a series of resolutions:  which resolutions are generally made at or immediately before the beginning of a New Year.  Without these the struggle would be formless, confused, blind and even more futile than it is with them.  Organised effort is bound to be less ineffective than unorganised effort.

* * * * *

A worldly ambition can be, frequently is, realised:  but an ideal cannot be attained—­if it could, it would not be an ideal.  The virtue of an ideal is its unattainability.  It seems, when it is first formed, just as attainable as a worldly ambition which indeed is often schemed as a means to it.  After twenty-four hours, the ideal is all but attained.  After forty-eight, it is a little farther off.  After a week, it has receded still further.  After a month it is far away; and towards the end of a year even the keen eye of hope has almost lost sight of it; it is definitely withdrawn from the practical sphere.  And then, such is the divine obstinacy of humanity, the turn of the year gives us an excuse for starting afresh, and forming a new ideal, and forgetting our shame in yet another organised effort.  Such is the annual circle of the ideal, the effort, the failure and the shame.  A rather pitiful history it may appear!  And yet it is also rather a splendid history!  For the failure and the shame are due to the splendour of our ideal and to the audacity of our faith in ourselves.  It is only in comparison with our ideal that we have fallen low.  We are higher, in our failure and our shame, than we should have been if we had not attempted to rise.

* * * * *

There are those who will say:  “At any rate, we might moderate somewhat the splendour of our ideal and the audacity of our self-conceit, so that there should be a less grotesque disparity between the aim and the achievement.  Surely such moderation would be more in accord with common sense!  Surely it would lessen the spiritual fatigue and disappointment caused by sterile endeavour!” It would.  But just try to moderate the ideal and the self-conceit!