Yes, indeed, I feel deeply with you that I have a mission in life.  But one must act in each instant as though that mission was having immediate fulfilment.  Do not let us keep back one single small corner of our hearts for our small hopes.  We must attain to this—­that no catastrophe whatsoever shall have power to cripple our lives, to interrupt them, to set them out of tune.  That is the finest work, and it is the work of this moment.  The rest, that future which we must not question—­you will see, mother dear, what it holds of beauty and goodness and truth.  Not one of our faculties must be used in vain, and all useless anxiety is a harmful expense.

Be happy in this great assurance that I give you—­that up till now I have raised my soul to a height where events have had no empire over it, and I promise you that my effort will be still to make ready my soul as much as I can.

Tell M——­ that if fate strikes down the best, there is no injustice:  those who survive will be the better men.  Let her accept the sacrifice, knowing that it is not in vain.  You do not know the things that are taught by him who falls.  I do know.

To him who can read life, present events have broken all habit of thought, but they allow him more glimpses than ever before of eternal beauty and order.

Let us recover from the surprise of this laceration, and adapt ourselves without loss of time to the new state of things which turns us into people as privileged as Socrates and the Christian martyrs and the men of the Revolution.  We are learning to despise all in life that is merely temporary, and to delight in that which life so seldom yields:  the love of those things that are eternal.

October 16.

We are living for some days in comparative calm; between two storms my company is deserving of special rest.  Also I am thoroughly enjoying this month of October.  Your fine letter of October 2 reaches me, and I am now full of happiness, and there is profound peace.

Let us continue to arm ourselves with courage, do not let us even speak of patience.  Nothing but to accept the present moment with all the treasures which it brings us.  That is all there is to do, and it is precisely in this that all the beauty of the world is concentrated.  There is something, dear mother, something outside all that we have habitually felt.  Apply your courage and your love of me to uncovering this, and laying it bare for others.

This new beauty has no reference to the ideas expressed in the words health, family, country.  One perceives it when one distinguishes the share of the eternal which is in everything.  But let us cherish this splendid presentiment of ours—­that we shall meet again:  it will not in any way impede our task.  Tell M——­ how much I think of her.  Alas! her case is not unique.  This war has broken many a hope; so, dear mother, let us put our hope there where the war cannot attain to it, in the deep places of our heart, and in the high places of our soul.