those terrible days when humanity and benevolence seemed the bitterest enemies of the ideal of justice, whereto he had sacrificed all; and in his great and noble doubt he marched bravely onwards, turning neither to right nor to left of him, going infinitely further than seemed to be reasonable, practical, just.  The violent death that was not unexpected came towards him, with half his road yet untravelled; to teach us that often in this strange conflict between man and his destiny, the question is not how to save the life of our body, but that of our most beautiful feelings, of our loftiest thoughts,

“Of what avail are my loftiest thoughts if I have ceased to exist?” there are some will ask; to whom others, it may be, will answer, “What becomes of myself if all that I love in my heart and my spirit must die, that my life may be saved?” And are not almost all the morals, and heroism, and virtue of man summed up in that single choice?

24.  But what may this wisdom be that we rate thus highly?  Let us not seek to define it too closely; that were but to enchain it.  If a man were desirous to study the nature of light, and began by extinguishing all the lights that were near, would not a few cinders, a smouldering wick, be all he would ever discover?  And so has it been with those who essayed definition.  “The word wise,” said Joubert, “when used to a child, is a word that each child understands, and that we need never explain.”  Let us accept it even as the child accepts it, that it may grow with our growth.  Let us say of wisdom what Sister Hadewijck, the mysterious enemy of Ruijsbroeck the Admirable, said of love:  “Its profoundest abyss is its most beautiful form.”  Wisdom requires no form; her beauty must vary, as varies the beauty of flame.  She is no motionless goddess, for ever couched on her throne.  She is Minerva who follows us, soars to the skies with us, falls to the earth with us, mingles her tears with our tears, and rejoices when we rejoice.  Truly wise you are not unless your wisdom be constantly changing from your childhood on to your death.  The more the word means to you, the more beauty and depth it conveys, the wiser must you become; and each step that one takes towards wisdom reveals to the soul ever-widening space, that wisdom never shall traverse.

25.  He who knows himself is wise; yet have we no sooner acquired real consciousness of our being than we learn that true wisdom is a thing that lies far deeper than consciousness.  The chief gain of increased consciousness is that it unveils an ever-loftier unconsciousness, on whose heights do the sources lie of the purest wisdom.  The heritage of unconsciousness is for all men the same; but it is situate partly within and partly without the confines of normal consciousness.  The bulk of mankind will rarely pass over the border; but true lovers of wisdom press on, till they open new routes that cross over the frontier.  If I love, and my love has procured me the fullest consciousness