about
their sins and negligences; one must have a very clear sense of one's
own victories over evil, and the tactics one has employed, to do that;
and if one is conscious, as I am, of not having made a very successful
show of resistance to personal faults and failings, the pastoral
attitude is not an easy one to adopt. But if one loves people, the
problem is not so difficult--or rather it solves itself. One can
compare notes, and discuss qualities, and try to see what one admires
and thinks beautiful; and the only way, after all, to make other people
good, if that is the end in view, is to be good oneself in such a way
that other people want to be good too.

The thing which really differentiates people from each other, and which
sets a few fine souls ahead of the crowd, is a certain clearness of
vision. Most of us take things for granted from the beginning, accept
the opinions and conventions of the world, and muddle along, taking
things as they come, our only aim being to collect in our own corner as
many of the good things of life as we can gather round us. Indeed, it
must be confessed that among the commonest motives for showing kindness
are the credit that results, and the sense of power and influence that
ensues. But that is no good at all to the giver. For the fact is that
behind life, as we see it, there lies a very strange and deep mystery,
something stronger and larger than we can any of us at all grasp. There
are a thousand roads to the city of God, and no two roads are the same,
though they all lead to the same place. If we take up the role of being
useful, the danger is that we become planted, like a kind of
professional guide-post, giving incomplete directions to others,
instead of finding the way for ourselves. The mistake lies in thinking
that things are unknowable when they are only unknown. Many mists have
melted already before the eyes of the pilgrims, and the tracks grow
plainer on the hillside; and thus the clearer vision of which I speak
is the thing to be desired by all. We must try to see things as they
are, not obscured by prejudice or privilege or sentiment or
selfishness; and sin does not cloud the vision so much as stupidity and
conceit. I have a dream, then, of what I desire and aspire to, though
it is hard to put it into words. I want to learn to distinguish between
what is important and unimportant, between what is beautiful and ugly,
between what is true and false. The pomps and glories o