e and powerless at the point where we no longer care to feel
its influence.

"The sentiment of effort exists no longer, since we are pleased to
resolve all difficulties without it.

"In this inconstant state of mind, common sense, after wandering a moment
withdraws itself, and we find that we are delivered over to all the
perils of imagination.

"Nothing that we see thus confusedly is found on the plane which belongs
to common sense; the ideas, associated by a capricious tie, bind and
unbind themselves, without imposing the necessity of a solution.

"The man who allows himself to be influenced by vague dreams," adds the
Shogun, "must, if he does not react powerfully, bid farewell to common
sense and reason; for he will experience so great a charm in forgetting,
even for one moment, the reality of life, that he will seek to prolong
this blest moment.

"He will renounce logic, whose conclusions are, at times, opposed to his
desires, and he will plunge himself into that false delight of awakened
dreams, or, as some say, day-dreams.

"Those who defend this artificial conception of happiness, like to
compare people of common sense to heavy infantry soldiers, who march
along through stony roads, while they depict themselves as pleasant
bird-fanciers, giving flight to the fantastic bearers of wings.

"But they do not take into account the fact that the birds, for whom they
open the cage, fly away without the intention of returning, leaving them
thus deceived and deprived of the birds, while the rough infantry
soldiers, after many hardships, reach the desired end which they had
proposed to attain, thus realizing the joys of conquest.

"There they find the rest and security, which the possessors of fugitive
birds will never know.

"Those who cultivate common sense will always ignore the collapses which
follow the disappearance of illusions.

"How many men have suffered thus uselessly!

"And what is more stupid than a sorrow, voluntarily imposed, when it can
not be productive of any good?

"Men can not be too strongly warned against the tendency of embellishing
everything that concerns the heart-life, and this is the inclination of
most people.

"The causes of this propensity are many and the need for that which
astounds is not the only cause to be mentioned.

"Indolence is never a stranger to illusion.

"It is so delightful to foresee a solution which conforms to our desires!

"For certain natures, stained wi