holds him in darkness, tear the veil that hides
him from the eternal, at any point where it is
easiest for him to do so, and most often this
point will be where he least expects to find it.
Men go in search of escape with the help of
their minds, and lay down arbitrary and limited
laws as to how to attain the, to them, unattainable.
Many, indeed, have hoped to pass
through by the way of religion, and instead they
have formed a place of thought and feeling so
marked and fixed that it seems as though long
ages would be insufficient to enable them to
get out of the rut! Some have believed that
by the aid of pure intellect a way was to be
found; and to such men we owe the philosophy
and metaphysics which have prevented the race
from sinking into utter sensuousness. But the
end of the man who endeavors to live by
thought alone is that he dwells in fantasies,
and insists on giving them to other men as
substantial food. Great is our debt to the meta-physicians
and transcendentalists; but he who
follows them to the bitter end, forgetting that
the brain is only one organ of use, will find
himself dwelling in a place where a dull
wheel of argument seems to turn forever on
its axis, yet goes nowhither and carries no
burden.

Virtue (or what seems to each man to be