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.

All religions were becoming beautifully less upon being subjected to
cold examination. Yet, nevertheless, they were producing saints and
martyrs, true super-men of morality. All revolutions had proved
imperfect and ineffectual when submitted to scientific revision. Yet,
nothwithstanding, they had brought forth the greatest individual
heroes, the most astonishing collective movements of history.

"To believe!... To dream!" a mysterious voice kept chanting in his
brain. "To have an idea