hat we have to do is to bring into agreement there
that from which the soul of Marcus Aurelius was free--three-fourths of
the sorrows of mankind, in a word--which have become real to us,
intelligible, human, and urgent, and are no longer regarded as the
inexplicable, immutable, intangible decrees of fatality.

31

This does not imply, however, that we should abandon the old sages'
desire for "agreement"; and even though we may not be entitled to
expect such perfect "agreement" as they derived from their pardonable
egoism, we may still look for agreement of a provisional, conditional
kind. And although such "agreement" be not the last word of morality,
it is none the less indispensable that we should begin by being as just
as we possibly can within ourselves and to those round about us, our
neighbours, our friends, and our servants. It is at the moment when we
have become absolutely just to these, and within our own consciousness,
that we realise our great injustice to all the others. The method of
being more practically just towards these last is not yet known to us;
to return to great, heroic renouncements would effect but little, for
these are incapable of unanimous action, and would probably run counter
to the profoundest laws of nature, which rejects renouncement in every
form save that of maternal love.

This practical justice, therefore, remains the secret of the race. Of
such secrets it has many, which it reveals one by one, at such moments
of history as become truly critical; and the solutions it offers to
insuperable difficulties are almost always unexpected, and of strangest
simplicity. The hour approaches, perhaps, when it will speak once
more. Let us hope, without being too sanguine; for we must bear in
mind that humanity has yet by no means emerged from the period of
"sacrificed generations." History has known no others; and it is
possible that, to the end of time, all generations may call themselves
sacrificed. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that the sacrifices,
however unjust and useless they still may be, are growing ever less
inhuman and less inevitable; and that the laws which govern them are
becoming better and better known, and would seem to draw nearer and
nearer to those that a lofty mind might accept without being pitiless.

32

It must be admitted, however, that a majestic, redoubtable slowness
attends the movements of these "ideas of the species." Centuries had
to pass befo