this white pebble or that tuft of grass that will cause it to fall to right or to left of the path?  And then, at the tragic halt of the carriage, in that black night:  at the terrible cry sent forth by young Drouet, “In the name of the Nation!” there had needed but one order from the king, one lash of the whip, one pull at the collar—­and you and I would probably not have been born, for the history of the world had been different.  And again, in presence of the mayor, who stood there, respectful, disconcerted, hesitating, ready to fling every gate open had but one imperious word been spoken; and at the shop of M. Sauce, the worthy village grocer; and, last of all, when Goguelat and de Choiseul had arrived with their hussars, bringing rescue, salvation—­did not all depend, a hundred times over, on a mere yes or no, a step, a gesture, a look?  Take any ten men with whom you are intimate, let them have been King of France, you can foretell the issue of their ten nights.  Ah, it was that night truly that heaped shame on fatality, that laid bare her weakness!  For that night revealed to all men the dependence, the wretched and shivering poverty of the great mysterious force that, in moments of undue resignation, seems to weigh so heavily on life!  Never before has she been beheld so completely despoiled of her vestments, of her imposing, deceptive robes, as she incessantly came and went that night, from death to life, from life to death; throwing herself at last, like a woman distraught, into the arms of an unhappy king, whom she besought til dawn for a decision, an existence, that she herself never can find save only in the depths of the will and the intellect of man.

22.  And yet this is not the entire truth.  It is helpful to regard events in this fashion, thus seeking to minimise the importance of fatality, looking upon it as some vague and wandering creature that we have to shelter and guide.  We gain the more courage thereby, the more confidence, initiative; and these are qualities essential to the doing of anything useful; and they shall stand us in good stead, too, when our own hour of danger draws nigh.  But for all that, we do not pretend that there truly is no other force—­that all things can be governed by our will and our intellect.  These must be trained to act like the soldiers of a conquering army; they must learn to thrive at the cost of all that opposes them; they must find sustenance even in the unknown that towers above them.  Those who desire to emerge from the ordinary habits of life, from the straitened happiness of mere pleasure-seeking men, must march with deliberate conviction along the path that is known to them, yet never forget the unexplored regions through which this path winds.  We must act as though we were masters—­as though all things were bound to obey us; and yet let us carefully tend in our soul a thought whose duty it shall be to offer noble submission to the mighty forces we may encounter.  It is well that the hand should believe that all is