MOTTO.


"The first philosophers, whether Chaldeans or Egyptians, said there
must be something within us which produces our thought. That something
must be very subtle: it is breath; it is fire, it is ether; it is a
quintessence; it is a slender likeness; it is an intelechia; it is a
number; it is harmony; lastly, according to the divine Plato, it is a
compound of the _same_ and the _other_! It is atoms which think in us,
said Epicurus after Democritus. But, my friend, how does an atom
think? Acknowledge that thou knowest nothing of the matter."
--VOLTAIRE.




I.



OUR IGNORANCE OF OURSELVES.


Self-Analysis, apart from its scientific uses, has seldom rewarded
those who have practised it. To probe into the inner world of motive
and desire has proved of small benefit to any one, whether hermit,
monk or nun, indeed it has been altogether mischievous in result,
unless the mind that probed, was especially healthy. Bitter has been