All his former existence appeared to him like a desert. He had lived without knowing why nor wherefore, challenging countless dangers and adventures for the mere pleasure of coming out victorious. Neither did he know with certainty what he had wanted until then. If it was money, it had flowed into his hands in the last months with overwhelming abundance…. He had it to-spare and it had not made him happy. As to professional glory, he could not desire anything greater than he already had. His name was celebrated all over the Spanish Mediterranean. Even the rudest and most ungovernable of sailors would admit his exceptional ability.
"Love remained!…" But Ferragut made a wry face when thinking of that. He had known it and did not wish to meet it again. The gentle love of a good companion, capable of surrounding the latter part of his existence with congenial comfort, he had just lost forever. The other, impassioned, fantastic, voluptuous, giving to life the crude interest of conflicts and contrasts, had left him with no desire of recommencing it.
Paternity, stronger and more enduring than love, might have filled the rest of his days had his son not died…. There only remained vengeance, the savage task of returning evil to those who had done him so much evil. But he was so powerless to struggle against all of them!… This final act appeared to be turning out so small and selfish in comparison with that other patriotic enthusiasm which was now dragging to sacrifice such great masses of men!…
While he was thinking it all over, a phrase which he had somewhere heard—formed perhaps from the residuum of old readings—began to chant in his brain: "A life without ideals is not worth the trouble of living."
Ferragut mutely assented. It was true: in order to live, an ideal is necessary. But where could he find it?…
Suddenly, in his mind's eye, he saw Toni,—just as when he used to try to express his confused thoughts. With all his credulity and simplicity, his captain now considered his humble mate his superior. In his own way Toni had his ideal: he was concerned with something besides his own selfishness. He wished for other men what he considered good for himself, and he defended his convictions with the mystical enthusiasm of all those historic personages who have tried to impose a belief;—with the faith of the warriors of the Cross and those of the Prophet, with the tenacity of the Inquisition and of the Jacobins.
He, a man of reason, had only known how to ridicule the generous and disinterested enthusiasms of other men, detecting at once their weak points and lack of adaptation to the reality of the moment…. What right had he to laugh at his mate who was a believer, dreaming, with the pure-mindedness of a child, of a free and happy humanity?… Aside from his stupid jeers, what could he oppose to that faith?…
Life began to appear to him under a new light, as something serious and mysterious that was exacting a bridge toll, a tribute of courage from all the beings who pass over it, leaving the cradle behind them and having the grave as a final resting-place.
It did not matter at all that their ideals might appear false. Where is the truth, the only and genuine truth?… Who is there that can demonstrate that he exists, and is not an illusion?…
The necessary thing was to believe in something, to have hope. The multitudes had never been touched by impulses of argument and criticism. They had only gone forward when some one had caused hopes and hallucinations to be born in their souls. Philosophers might vainly seek the truth by the light of logic, but the rest of mankind would always prefer the chimerical ideals that become transformed into powerful motives of action.