to enjoy the beauty of the greater and the lesser light. We must
understand whence they come and whither they go--after that, what
they are made of and how much they weigh. We thought for such a long
time that our toil would end in something; that we might become as
gods, knowing good and evil. Now we are at the end of our tether, we
see clearly enough that it has all been worse than vain; how good if
we could unlearn it all, scatter the building of phantasmal
knowledge in which we dwell so uncomfortably! It is too late. The
gods never take back their gifts; we wearied them with our prayers
into granting us this one, and now they sit in the clouds and mock
us."

Ida looked, and kept silent; perhaps scarcely understood.

"People kill themselves in despair," Waymark went on, "that is, when
they have drunk to the very dregs the cup of life's bitterness. If
they were wise, they would die at that moment--if it ever comes--
when joy seems supreme and stable. Life can give nothing further,
and it has no more hellish misery than disillusion following upon
delight."

"Did you ever seriously think of killing yourself?" Ida asked,
gazing at him closely.

"Yes. I have reached at times the point when I would not have moved
a muscle to escape death, and from that it is not far to suicide.
But my joy had never come, and it is hard to go away without that
one draught.--And you!"

"I went so far once as to buy poison. But neither had I tasted any