impressions which in human relations are produced by the strong man's
majesty and the maiden's sweetest smile.

On this same summer-day, another man has also risen before the sun. He
is devoted to the assuaging of human miseries, and he has had much to
do. He has mounted gloomy staircases; he has entered dark chambers; he
has spent time in hospitals, in the midst of the pains of sickness; he
has come, in prisons, to the relief of pains which are sadder still.
Day, as it dawned, gilded the summits of the Alps, but he saw not that
pure light of the morning. Day, as it advanced, penetrated into the
valleys, but he did not notice its progress. The sun set in his glory,
but he had no opportunity to admire either the bright reflection of the
waters, or the rosy tint of the mountains. And yet he too is joyful
because he loves. He loves the fulfilment of stern duty, he loves
poverty solaced, and suffering alleviated.

Here are the two kinds of love. The disciple of Plato rises, far from
the vulgarities of life, into the lofty regions of the ideal, and feeds
on beauty. Vincent de Paul takes the place of a convict at the galleys
that he may restore a father to his children. These two kinds of love
seem to us to be contrary one to the other: the one seeks itself, and
the other gives itself. Still they are both necessary to life, for in
order to give we must receive. In the accomplishment of the works of
goodness, the soul would be impoverished and would end by drying up in
a purely mechanical exercise of beneficence, had it no spring from which
to draw forth the living waters. Man must himself find joy in order to
diffuse it amongst his fellows. But mark the incomparable marvel of the
spiritual order of things! The love which gives itself is able to find
its worthiest object and its purest satisfaction in the very act of
kindness. There is joy in self-devotion; there is happiness in