d
out aloud since the first day when hope, the undying, came down on
earth. It may be there, close by, disregarded, invisible, quite at hand.
But it's no good. I believe there are men who can lay hold of a needle
in a pottle of hay at the first try. For myself, I have never had such
luck.

And then there is that accent. Another difficulty. For who is going to
tell whether the accent is right or wrong till the word is shouted,
and fails to be heard, perhaps, and goes downwind leaving the world
unmoved. Once upon a time there lived an Emperor who was a sage and
something of a literary man. He jotted down on ivory tablets thoughts,
maxims, reflections which chance has preserved for the edification of
posterity. Amongst other sayings--I am quoting from memory--I remember
this solemn admonition: "Let all thy words have the accent of heroic
truth." The accent of heroic truth! This is very fine, but I am thinking
that it is an easy matter for an austere Emperor to jot down grandiose
advice. Most of the working truths on this earth are humble, not heroic:
and there have been times in the history of mankind when the accents of
heroic truth have moved it to nothing but derision.

Nobody will expect to find between the covers of this little book words
of extraordinary potency or accents of irresistible heroism. However
humiliating for my self-esteem, I must confess that the counsels of
Marcus Aurelius are not for me. They are more fit for a moralist than
for an artist. Truth of a modest sort I can promise you, and also
sincerity. That complete, praiseworthy sincerity which, while it
delivers one into the hands of one's enemies, is as likely as not to
embroil one with one's friends.

"Embroil" is perhaps too strong an expression. I can't imagine either
amongst my enemies or my friends a being so hard up for something to do
as to quarrel with me. "To disappoint one's friends" would be nearer
the mark. Most, almost all, friendships of the writing period of my life
have come to me through my books; and I know that a novelist lives
in his work. He stands there, the only reality in an invented world,
amongst imaginary things, happenings, and people. Writing about them,
he is only writing about himself. But the disclosure is not complete. He
remains to a certain extent a figure behind the veil; a suspected rather
than a seen presence--a movement and a voice behind the draperies of
fiction. In these personal notes there is no such veil