found, deep down in your love—­this it is that will help to fashion your life.  If you have been deceived, it is not the deception that matters, but the forgiveness whereto it gave birth in your soul, and the loftiness, wisdom, completeness of this forgiveness—­by these shall your life be steered to destiny’s haven of brightness and peace; by these shall your eyes see more clearly than if all men had ever been faithful.  But if, by this act of deceit, there have come not more simpleness, loftier faith, wider range to your love, then have you been deceived in vain, and may truly say nothing has happened.

10.  Let us always remember that nothing befalls us that is not of the nature of ourselves.  There comes no adventure but wears to our soul the shape of our everyday thoughts; and deeds of heroism are but offered to those who, for many long years, have been heroes in obscurity and silence.  And whether you climb up the mountain or go down the hill to the valley, whether you journey to the end of the world or merely walk round your house, none but yourself shall you meet on the highway of fate.  If Judas go forth to-night, it is towards Judas his steps will tend, nor will chance for betrayal be lacking; but let Socrates open his door, he shall find Socrates asleep on the threshold before him, and there will be occasion for wisdom.  Our adventures hover around us like bees round the hive when preparing to swarm.  They wait till the mother-idea has at last come forth from our soul, and no sooner has she appeared than they all come rushing towards her.  Be false, and falsehoods will haste to you; love, and adventures will flock to you, throbbing with love.  They seem to be all on the watch for the signal we hoist from within:  and if the soul grow wiser towards evening, the sorrow will grow wiser too that the soul had fashioned for itself in the morning.

11.  No great inner event befalls those who summon it not; and yet is there germ of great inner event in the smallest occurrence of life.  But events such as these are apportioned by justice, and to each man is given of the spoil in accord with his merits.  We become that which we discover in the sorrows and joys that befall us; and the least expected caprices of fate soon mould themselves on our thoughts.  It is in our past that destiny finds all her weapons, her vestments, her jewels.  Were the only son of Thersites and Socrates to die the same day, Socrates’ grief would in no way resemble the grief of Thersites.  Misfortune or happiness, it seems, must be chastened ere it knock at the door of the sage; but only by stooping low can it enter the commonplace soul.

12.  As we become wiser we escape some of our instinctive destinies.  There is in us all sufficient desire for wisdom to transform into consciousness most of the hazards of life.  And all that has thus been transformed can belong no more to the hostile powers.  A sorrow your soul has changed into sweetness, to indulgence or patient smiles, is a sorrow that shall never return without spiritual ornament; and a fault or defect you have looked in the face can harm you no more, or even be harmful to others.