nderstanding of that ideal and a just appreciation of its
value. So they think out the ideal with greater precision and make
sure that what they are aiming at is nothing short of the highest.
Now the ideal of fellowship enriched with beauty and elevated to the
Divine is one which all can understand and of which all can see the
value. Because it is the highest it is satisfying to the deepest needs
and cravings of their nature, and is therefore of a value beyond all
reckoning. Assured of that, they summon up all the courage and
fortitude that is theirs, all their spirit and mettle, to endure
unflinchingly the pain that must be theirs. And in spite of the effort,
the long, strict training, the rigid discipline, the hardship and
suffering they have to undergo, they joyfully play their part because
they are assured in their hearts that what they are living for and
would readily die for is supremely worth while. Deep in their hearts
is that divine joy of battle that fighters for the highest always feel.
And they fight with power and conviction because they know that
their ideal has come into their hearts straight from Nature herself,
and experience has shown that what Nature has in mind she does in
the end achieve: she not only has the will and intention but the
_power_ to carry into effect what she determines.

* * *

This is how we formulate the ideal to ourselves in ever-developing
completeness; and this is how with pain and effort but with
over-compensating joy we carry it into effect. And these experiences of
ours in the formulation and working out of our ideal give us the clue
to the manner in which Nature on her part works out _her_ ideal.
We are the representations and representatives of the whole, and we
may assume that the whole works in much the same way as we
ourselves work. If this be so we may expect to find that Nature will
work as an _artist_ works, that is, out of his own inner
consciousness, spontaneously generating and continually creating
new and original forms approaching (through a process of trial and
error experimentation) more and more closely to that ideal of
perfection which he has always, though often unconsciously, before
him. And this is how we actually do find Nature working. We find
her reaching after perfection of form, now in one direction, now in
another; first in plants, next in animals, then in insects, then in birds,
then in apes, then in men, here in one type and there in another,
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