riousness. And thus many of our
fears arise from old inheritance, and represent nothing rational or
real at all, but only an old and savage need of vigilance and wariness.

One can see this exemplified in a curious way in level tracts of
country. Everyone who has traversed places like the plain of
Worcestershire must remember the irritating way in which the roads keep
ascending little eminences, instead of going round at the foot. Now
these old country roads no doubt represent very ancient tracks indeed,
dating from times when much of the land was uncultivated. They get
stereotyped, partly because they were tracks, and partly because for
convenience the first enclosures and tillages were made along the roads
for purposes of communication. But the perpetual tendency to ascend
little eminences no doubt dates from a time when it was safer to go up,
in order to look round and to see ahead, partly in order to be sure of
one's direction, and partly to beware of the manifold dangers of the
road.

And thus many of the fears by which one is haunted are these old
survivals, these inherited anxieties. Who does not know the frame of
mind when perhaps for a day, perhaps for days together, the mind is
oppressed and uneasy, scenting danger in the air, forecasting calamity,
recounting all the possible directions in which fate or malice may have
power to wound and hurt us? It is a melancholy inheritance, but it
cannot be combated by any reason. It is of no use then to imitate
Robinson Crusoe, and to make a list of one's blessings on a piece of
paper; that only increases our fear, because it is just the chance of
forfeiting such blessings of which we are in dread! We must simply
remind ourselves that we are surrounded by old phantoms, and that we
derive our weakness from ages far back, in which risks were many and
security was rare.

VI

FEARS OF CHILDHOOD

If I look back over my own life, I can discern three distinct stages of
fear and anxieties, and I expect it is the same with most people. The
terrors of childhood are very mysterious things, and their horror
consists in the child's inability to put the dread into words. I
remember how one night, when we were living in the Master's Lodge at
Wellington College, I had gone to bed, and waking soon afterwards heard
a voice somewhere outside. I got out of bed, went to the door, and
looked out. Close to my door was an archway which looked into the open
gallery that ran round t