nging world are
best caught, best analysed, and best interpreted, as we overtake them
in their dreamy passage from mystery to mystery.

The mere fact of his basic assumption that final truth in any
direction is undiscoverable--possibly undesirable also--sets him with
the wisest and sanest of all the most interesting writers. It sets him
"en rapport" with nature, too, in a very close and intimate affiliation.
It sets him at one spring at the very parting of the ways where all the
mysteries meet. Nature loves to reveal the most delicate side-lights
and the most illuminating glimpses to those who take this attitude.
Such disinterestedness brings its own reward.

To love truth for the sake of power or gain or pride or success is a
contemptible prostitution; to love it for its own sake is a tragic
foolishness. What is truth--in itself--that it should be loved? But to
love it for the pleasure of pursuing it, that is the temper dear to the
immortal gods. For this is indeed their own temper, the very way
they themselves--the shrewd undying ones--regard the dream
shadows of the great kaleidoscope.

It is a subtle and hard saying this, that truth must be played with
lightly to be freely won, but it has a profound and infinite
significance. Illuminating thoughts--thoughts with the bloom and
gloss and dew of life itself upon them--do not come to the person
who with puritanical austerity has grown lean in his wrestling. They
come when we have ceased to care whether they come or not. They
come when from the surface of the tide and under the indifferent
stars we are content to drift and listen, without distress, to the
humming waters.

As Goethe says, it is of little avail that we go forth with our screws
and our levers. Tugged at so and mauled, the magic of the universe
slips away from out of our very fingers. It is better to stroll
negligently along the highways of the world careless of everything
except "the pleasure which there is in life itself," and then, in
Goethe's own phrase, "Such thoughts will come of themselves and
cry like happy children--'Here we are.'"

There is indeed required--and herein may be found the secret of
Remy de Gourmont's evasive talent--a certain fundamental
_irresponsibility,_ if we are to become clairvoyant critics of life. As
soon as we grow responsible, or become conscious of responsibility,
something or other comes between us and the clear object of our
curiosity, blurring its outline and confu