able dulness is the privilege of the
lunatic; the lunatic, who is the true aristocrat of nature--the unique
man in a tower of ivory, the elect, who, in samite robes, traverses
moody gardens. Really, I shudder at the idea of ever living again in
yonder stewpot of humanity, with all its bad smells. To struggle with
the fools for their idiotic prizes is beyond me. The lunatic asylum--"

"Can't you find some other word?" asked Quell, dryly.

"--is the best modern equivalent for the tub of Diogenes--he who was the
first Solitary, the first Individualist. To dream one's dreams, to be
alone--"

"How about McKracken and the keepers?"

"From the volatile intellects of madmen are fashioned the truths of
humanity. Mental repose is death. All our modern theocrats,
politicians,--whose minds are sewers for the people,--and lawyers are
corpses, their brains dead from feeding on dead ideas. Motion is
life--mad minds are always in motion."

"Let up there! You talk like the doctor chaps over at the crazy crib,"
interrupted Quell.

"Ah, if we could only arrange our dreams in chapters--as in a novel.
Sometimes Nature does it for us. There is really a beginning, a
development, a denouement. But, for the most of us, life is a crooked
road with weeds so high that we can't see the turn of the path. Now, my
case--I'm telling you my story after all--my case is a typical one of
the artistic sort. I wrote prose, verse, and dissipated with true
poetic regularity. It was after reading Nietzsche that I decided to quit
my stupid, sinful ways. Yes, you may smile! It was Nietzsche who
converted me. I left the old crowd, the old life in Paris, went to
Brittany, studied new rhythms, new forms, studied the moon; and then
people began to touch their foreheads knowingly. I was suspected simply
because I did not want to turn out sweet sonnets about the pretty stars.
Why, man, I have a star in my stomach! Every poet has. We are of the
same stuff as the stars. It was Marlowe who said, 'A sound magician is a
mighty god.' He was wrong. Only the mentally unsound are really wise.
This the ancients knew. Even if Gerard de Nerval did walk the boulevards
trolling a lobster by a blue ribbon--that is no reason for judging him
crazy. As he truly said, 'Lobsters neither bark nor bite; and they know
the secrets of the sea!' His dreams simply overflowed into his daily
existence. He had the courage of his dreams. Do you remember his
declaring that the sun never appear