uccess in examinations, would be considered rather
abnormal and eccentric both by his instructors and his schoolfellows,
though he would not be thought singular by any one if he did the same
about his athletic prospects. What one cannot help wondering is whether
this kind of enthusiasm is valuable to the character under its
influence, whatever the subject of that enthusiasm may be. The normal
boy, who is enthusiastic about athletics, tends to be cynical about
intellectual success; and indeed even eminent men are not ashamed to
encourage this by uttering, as a Lord Chancellor lately did,
good-humoured gibes about the futility of dons and schoolmasters, and
the uselessness of lectures. The other day a young friend of mine
indulged in a glowing description, in my presence, of the methods and
form of a certain short-distance runner. It was a generous panegyric,
full of ingenuous admiration. He spoke of the runner's devices--I fear
I cannot reproduce the technical terms--with the same thrilled and
awestruck emotion which Shelley might have used, as an undergraduate,
in speaking of Homer or Shakespeare. I suppose it is a desirable thing,
on the whole, to be able to run faster than other people, though the
practical utility of being able to do a hundred yards in a fraction of
a second less than other runners is not easily demonstrable. But for
all that I cannot help wondering whether such enthusiasm is not thrown
away or misapplied. Perhaps the same indictment might be made against
all warmly expressed admiration for human performances. The greatest
philosopher or poet in the world is, after all, a very limited being.
The knowledge possessed by the wisest man of science is a very minute
affair when compared with what there remains in the universe to know;
the finest picture ever painted compares very unfavourably with the
beauty that surrounds us every minute of every day. The question, to my
mind, is whether we do not do ourselves harm in the long-run by losing
ourselves in frantic admiration for any human performance. The Psalmist
expressed this feeling very cogently and humorously when he said that
the Creator did not delight in any man's legs. The question is not
whether it is not a natural temptation to limit our dreams of ultimate
possibilities by the standard of human effort, but whether we ought to
try and resist that temptation. When I was at a private school, I heard
a boy express the most fervent and unfeigned admirat