longer so susceptible to separate and radical change. The real
nature of the complex stuff of life they were seeking to work in is
revealed to them--its intricate and delicate fiber, and the subtle,
secret interrelationship of its parts--and they work circumspectly,
lest they should mar more than they mend. Moral enthusiasm is not,
uninstructed and of itself, a suitable guide to practicable and
lasting reformation; and if the reform sought be the reformation of
others as well as of himself, the reformer should look to it that he
knows the true relation of his will to the wills of those he would
change and guide. When he has discovered that relation, he has come
to himself: has discovered his real use and planning part in the
general world of men; has come to the full command and satisfying
employment of his faculties. Otherwise he is doomed to live for
ever in a fool's paradise, and can be said to have come to himself
only on the supposition that he is a fool.


VI

Every man--if I may adopt and paraphrase a passage from Dr. South--
every man hath both an absolute and a relative capacity: an absolute
in that he hath been endued with such a nature and such parts and
faculties; and a relative in that he is part of the universal
community of men, and so stands in such a relation to the whole.
When we say that a man has come to himself, it is not of his
absolute capacity that we are thinking, but of his relative. He has
begun to realize that he is part of a whole, and to know what part,
suitable for what service and achievement.

It was once fashionable--and that not a very long time ago--to speak of