that flashes across him. Evil at times would seem compelled to beg a
ray of light from virtue, to shed lustre on its triumph. Is it
possible for a man to smile in his hatred and not borrow the smile
of love? But the smile will be short-lived, for here, as everywhere,
there is no inner injustice. Within the soul the high-water mark of
happiness is always level with that of justice or charity--which
words I use here indifferently, for indeed what is charity or love
but justice with naught to do but count its jewels? The man who goes
forth to seek his happiness in evil does merely prove thereby that
he is less happy than the other who watches, and disapproves. And
yet his object is identical with that of the upright man. He too is
in search of happiness, of some sort of peace and certainty. Of what
avail to punish him? We do not blame the poor because their home is
not a palace; it is sad enough to be compelled to live in a hovel.
He whose eyes can see the invisible, knows that in the soul of the
most unjust man there is justice still: justice, with all her
attributes, her stainless garments and holy activity. He knows that
the soul of the sinner is ever balancing peace and love, and the
consciousness of life, no less scrupulously than the soul of
philosopher, saint, or hero; that it watches the smiles of earth--
and sky, and is no less aware of all whereby those smiles are
destroyed, degraded, and poisoned. We are not wrong, perhaps, to be
heedful of justice in the midst of a universe that heeds not at all;
as the bee is not wrong to make honey in a world that itself can
make none. But we are wrong to desire an external justice, since we
know that it does not exist. Let that which is in us suffice. All is
for ever being weighed and judged in our soul. It is we who shall
judge ourselves; or rather, our happiness is our judge.

83. It may be urged that virtue is subject to defeat and