longer honors the name of God
with a festival, I will strive still to keep the feast to Him in my
heart.

CHAPTER VII

THE PRICE OF POWER AND THE WORTH OF FAME

Sunday, July 1st

Yesterday the month dedicated to Juno (Junius, June) by the Romans ended.
To-day we enter on July.

In ancient Rome this latter month was called Quintiles (the fifth),
because the year, which was then divided into only ten parts, began in
March. When Numa Pompilius divided it into twelve months this name of
Quintiles was preserved, as well as those that followed--Sexteles,
September, October, November, December--although these designations did
not accord with the newly arranged order of the months. At last, after a
time the month Quintiles, in which Julius Caesar was born, was called
Julius, whence we have July. Thus this name, placed in the calendar, is
become the imperishable record of a great man; it is an immortal epitaph
on Time's highway, engraved by the admiration of man.

How many similar inscriptions are there! Seas, continents, mountains,
stars, and monuments, have all in succession served the same purpose! We
have turned the whole world into a Golden Book, like that in which the
state of Venice used to enroll its illustrious names and its great deeds.
It seems that mankind feels a necessity for honoring itself in its elect
ones, and that it raises itself in its own eyes by choosing heroes from
among its own race. The human family love to preserve the memory; of the
parvenus of glory, as we cherish that of a great ancestor, or of a
benefactor.

In fact, the talents granted to a single individual do not benefit
himself alone, but are gifts to the world; everyone shares them, for
everyone suffers or benefits by his actions. Genius is a lighthouse,
meant to give light from afar; the man who bears it is but the rock upon
which this lighthouse is built.

I love to dwell upon these thoughts; they explain to me in what consists
our admiration for glory. When glory has benefited men, that admiration
is gratitude; when it is only remarkable in itself, it is the pride of
race; as men, we love to immortalize the most shining examples of
humanity.

Who knows whether we do not obey the same instinct in submitting to the
hand of power? Apart from the requirements of a gradation of ranks, or
the consequences of a conquest, the multitude delight to surround their
chiefs with privileges--whether it be that their vanity makes them th