Then on that mood, rising like a star into the blue spaces of the
evening, came the thought that the old days were not dead after
all. That they were assuredly there, just as the future was there,
a true part of oneself, ineffaceable, eternal. And hard on the
heels of that came another and a deeper intuition still, that not
in such delights did the secret really rest; what then was the
secret? It was surely this: that one must advance, led onward like
a tottering child by the strong arm of God. That the new knowledge
of suffering and sorrow was as beautiful as the old, and more so,
and that instead of repining over the vanished joys, one might
continue to rejoice in them and even rejoice in having lost them,
for I seemed to perceive that one's aim was not, after all, to be
lively, and joyful, and strong, but to be wiser, and larger-minded,
and more hopeful, even at the expense of delight. And then I saw
that I would not really for any price part with the sad wisdom that
I had reluctantly learnt, but that though the burden galled my
shoulder, it held within it precious things which I could not throw
away. And I had, too, the glad sense that even if in a childish
petulance I would have laid my burden down and run off among the
flowers, God was stronger than I, and would not suffer me to lose
what I had gained.
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