had
undertaken, when a thought darted suddenly into his mind, suggested by
the image of the man of science who had beguiled an afternoon hour for
him. It was a complicated thought at first, but it grew clearer. He
perceived, as in a vision, humanity moving onwards to some unseen goal.
He took account, as from a great height, of all those who are in the
forefront of thought and intellectual movement. He saw them working
soberly and patiently in their appointed lines. He discerned that
though all these persons imagined that they had purposely taken up some
form of intellectual labour, and were pursuing it with a definite end
in view, they had really no choice in the matter, but were being led
along certain ways by as sure and faithful an instinct as the bees that
he had seen that day intent on their murderous business. Each of these
savants, in whatever line his labours lay, felt that he was striding
forward on a quest proposed, as he imagined, by himself. But Hugh saw,
with an inward certainty of vision, that the current which moved them
was one with which they could not interfere, and that it was but the
inner movement of some larger and wider mind which propelled them. He
saw too that many of his friends, men of practical learning, who were
occupied, with a deep sense of importance and concern, in accumulating
a little treasure of facts and inferences, in science, in history, in
language, in philosophy, were but led by an inner instinct, an
implanted taste, along the paths they supposed themselves to be
choosing and laboriously pursuing. They encouraged each other at
intervals by the bestowal of little honours and dignities; but at this
moment Hugh saw them as mere toilers; like the merchants who spend busy
and unattractive lives, sitting in noisy offices, acquiring money with
which to found a family, with the curious ambition that descendants of
their own, whom they could never see, should lead a pleasant life in
stately country-houses, intent upon shooting and games, on social
gatherings and petty business. He saw clearly that the merchant and
the philosopher alike had no clear idea of what they desired to effect,
but merely followed a path prepared and indicated. And then he saw
that the minds which were really in the forefront of all were the
poetical minds, the interpreters, the prophets, who saw, not in minute
detail, and in small definite sections, but with a wide and large view,
whither all this discov