more prodigal with one's joy than
with one's sorrow. The sum of both joy and sorrow, it is said, are
immutably the same in the world from eternity. And of these each soul
born is allotted its reasonable share as the gods adjudge it. So that if
one takes too much joy out of the common lot, some one, perhaps many
ones, must receive less than they ought.

Thus, one not only limits the rights of his fellow-men, who has no
warrant to do so, but impiously exercises the prerogatives of the gods,
than which nothing can be more heinous.

For this larceny of joy, therefore, the culprit must suffer more than
his share of woe, until the heavenly balance is once more restored. And
that may be in this life or another, in this world or another.

So you observe that in Japan, among those who yet believe in the old
ways of the gods (and they are many!), it is perilous to be over-happy.
For one is almost certain to pay for it with over-woe. And this is the
happy catching of the tai and the melancholy note of the uguisu which
wind through the carols of one's joy in the East.

Yet, when one is always happy, as Shijiro Arisuga was before we knew
him, it seems difficult to say that here or there was a happier moment.

Therefore, you are to learn of each of these five occasions in their
order, according to your patience, and, quite at the end, you are to be
left to judge for yourself, which was, indeed, the happiest moment of
Shijiro Arisuga's life. There will come a time, too,--at the end,--when
you will know nothing of Shijiro Arisuga's own views upon the subject:
he will not be there to tell them. I shall try to interpret for him. But
you are not to be prejudiced by this judgment of mine, since you cannot
know Shijiro Arisuga as well as I do until the end is reached--quite the
end.

And it is nothing--the little story--you are, further, warned, until the
woman enters. Indeed; nothing is anything--no story--until woman enters.
Try to fancy Eden without Eve!

Not that Star-Dream is another Eve; nor that this is like the first love
story. But there is a Garden and a Serpent; an Apple and a Woman. And,
from that Garden, Shijiro Arisuga is driven with a sword which flames.
But here my story differs entirely from that of the first love story.
For the woman is left in the garden--alone! And it is eternal night.
And she can hardly stay there alone. For the uguisu sings. I wonder if
Eve could have been happy in Eden alone? With the singing