Colville could not deny himself the pleasure of saying, "Well, not the highest, I suppose."
"No," said Mr. Waters, in apparent unconsciousness of the irony. "But I think the Church has made a mistake in condemning the theatre in toto. It appears to me that it might always have countenanced a certain order of comedy, in which the motive and plot are unobjectionable. Though I don't deny that there are moods when all laughter seems low and unworthy and incompatible with the most advanced state of being. And I confess," he went on, with a dreamy thoughtfulness, "that I have very great misgivings in regard to tragedy. The glare that it throws upon the play of the passions—jealousy in its anguish, revenge glutting itself, envy eating its heart, hopeless love—their nakedness is terrible. The terror may be salutary; it may be very mischievous. I am afraid that I have left some of my inquiries till it is too late. I seem to have no longer the materials of judgment left in me. If I were still a young man like you——"
"Am I still a young man?" interrupted Colville sadly.
"You are young enough to respond to the appeals that sometimes find me silent. If I were of your age I should certainly investigate some of these interesting problems."
"Ah, but if you become personally interested in the problems, it's as bad as if you hadn't the materials of judgment left; you're prejudiced. Besides, I doubt my youthfulness very much."
"You are fifty, I presume?" suggested Mr. Waters, in a leading way.
"Not very near—only too near," laughed Colville. "I'm forty-one."
"You are younger than I supposed. But I remember now that at your age I had the same feeling which you intimate. It seemed to me then that I had really passed the bound which separates us from the further possibility of youth. But I've lived long enough since to know that I was mistaken. At forty, one has still a great part of youth before him—perhaps the richest and sweetest part. By that time the turmoil of ideas and sensations is over; we see clearly and feel consciously. We are in a sort of quiet in which we peacefully enjoy. We have enlarged our perspective sufficiently to perceive things in their true proportion and relation; we are no longer tormented with the lurking fear of death, which darkens and embitters our earlier years; we have got into the habit of life; we have often been ailing and we have not died. Then we have time enough behind us to supply us with the materials of reverie and reminiscence; the terrible solitude of inexperience is broken; we have learned to smile at many things besides the fear of death. We ought also to have learned pity and patience. Yes," the old man concluded, in cheerful self-corroboration, "it is a beautiful age."
"But it doesn't look so beautiful as it is," Colville protested. "People in that rosy prime don't produce the effect of garlanded striplings upon the world at large. The women laugh at us; they think we are fat old fellows; they don't recognise the slender and elegant youth that resides in our unwieldy bulk."
"You take my meaning a little awry. Besides, I doubt if even the ground you assume is tenable. If a woman has lived long enough to be truly young herself, she won't find a man at forty either decrepit or grotesque. He can even make himself youthful to a girl of thought and imagination."