earning in theories of disease. "I
have come," he said, "in the hope that you will take an interest in my
experiments and conclusions with regard to disease in general. I have
discovered that the one cure for rheumatism, consumption, and cancer is
salt, plenty of common salt."

The trouble with all these people is not that they are all wrong. They
are probably all right. It is a question of angles and quality of the
grey matter of the brain. The trouble is the limitation of experience
and outlook imposed by fate upon each individual.

A league or society is theoretically the one human institution which is
akin to heaven. You have an object and a programme. You know you are
occupied with the most important task in the world. But you feel
powerless alone. You send out your appeal for support and kindred souls
flock to your banner. Can anything be more soul-satisfying than a
community of those who think alike, who feel alike, and who work for the
same end? Anarchy is impossible, and you decide on a constitution and
rules for the management of your spiritual brotherhood. A committee is
appointed to control the affairs of the union, and officials to carry
out its wishes. Now you have the ideal of which you dreamt, the pure
collective force which should prove irresistible. Friends within and
enemies without.

But you have not excluded the canker of human differences. Your kindred
souls discover that, though they think alike on the one point which drew
you together, they differ strongly on others. There are other opinions,
religious and political, than those which come within the purview of
your little organization. You surprise some of your friends in the act
of discussing your denseness in matters of which they have a firm and
clear grasp. You begin to wonder how it is possible for people who have
such a perfect vision of certain necessary lines of reform to manifest
such unmitigated stupidity in regard to others. If you are wise, you
resign yourself to the inevitable divergence of mind; if they are wise,
they agree to pardon your shortcomings.

Fanatics flower in a society like poppies in a wheat-field. They have
lost sight of everything but the urgency of the cause. They are
intolerant because they have no knowledge of human nature and no
self-criticism wherewith to check the wild ideas that sprout beneath
their immense self-confidence. They turn withering scorn on committees
and officials who refuse to give effect to