* * * * *
We both feel the call to service and often have discussed where we may fit in to do our little part. For a life that is closed in about our own self-centered enjoyment is now impossible. We see the failure of our generation,—its failure to rise to its opportunities and responsibilities, its consequent weakening and approaching impotence and the inevitable surging up from beneath of another more virile force; the substitution of a natural for an artificial power (as Alan would have said). It is a challenge.
Once, when we were discussing this, Anne said to me a very searching thing.
“David, our kind hasn’t even the instinct of self-preservation.”
True—but if we haven’t we shall have to yield, as we should yield.
Anne constantly surprises me. I find in her such an eager outlook on life,—a longing to read, to explore, to question, to find an illuminating purpose for living. Her mind, as it awakens, leads mine on, and I react to its stimulus.
* * * * *
I have no illusion about myself. The part I may be called on to play is but a little part in the progress of my country. Yet, there must be thousands of us—quiet, patient lieutenants—to make possible the coming of a real leader.
* * * * *
I think I understand better now the mystery of good and evil, the thought that has run all through these pages,—often groping, turned back on itself, and often in seeming contradiction. Sometimes out of evil there comes a healthy reaction, but the moral quality of an act remains, much as we should like to believe otherwise. Temptations, the great salient temptations that determine a life, are as rare as opportunities. They are opportunities to be met and dominated. Neither Letty nor any of her kind can to-day even for a moment swerve me from my clear perception of values. That, at least, I know. Yet, in my memory that will always be a tithe to be paid. I have won a certain mastery,—but a scar will abide.