f the buildings; it
seemed like a place of manufacture, with a busy life of its own. But
here I suddenly felt that I could go no further, but must return. I
hoped that I should see the grim place again, and I desired with all my
soul to go down into it, and see what eager life it was that was being
lived there. And the boy, I saw, felt this too, and was impatient to
proceed. So we said farewell with much tenderness, and the boy went down
swiftly across the moorland, till he met some one who was coming out of
the city, and conferred a little with him; and then he turned and waved
his hand to me, and I waved my hand from the brow of the hill, envying
him in my heart, and went back in sorrow into the sunshine of the wood.

And as I did so I had a great joy, because I saw Amroth come suddenly
running to me out of the wood, who put his arm through mine, and walked
with me. Then I told him of all I had seen and thought, while he smiled
and nodded and told me it was much as I imagined. "Yes," he said, "it is
even so. The souls you have seen in this fine country here are just as
children who are given their fill of pleasant things. Many of them have
come into the state in which you see them from no fault of their own,
because their souls are young and ignorant. They have shrunk from all
pain and effort and tedium, like a child that does not like his lessons.
There is no thought of punishment, of course. No one learns anything of
punishment except a cowardly fear. We never advance until we have the
will to advance, and there is nothing in mere suffering, unless we learn
to bear it gently for the sake of love. On earth it is not God but man
who is cruel. There is indeed a place of sorrow, which you will see when
you can bear the sight, where the self-righteous and the harsh go for a
time, and all those who have made others suffer because they believed in
their own justice and insight. You will find there all tyrants and
conquerors, and many rich men, who used their wealth heedlessly; and
even so you will be surprised when you see it. But those spirits are the
hardest of all to help, because they have loved nothing but their own
virtue or their own ambition; yet you will see how they too are drawn
thence; and now that you have had a sight of the better country, tell me
how you liked it."

"Why," I said, "it is plain and austere enough; but I felt a great
quickening of spirit, and a desire to join in the labours of the place."

A