of the external forces,
such as air, fire, water, the laws of gravity and others, with which we
must deal and do battle. The need is heavy upon us to find excuses for
fate; and even when blaming her, we seem to be endeavouring still to
explain the causes of her past and her future action, conscious the
while of a feeling of pained surprise, as though a man we valued highly
had done some dreadful deed. We love to idealise destiny, and are wont
to credit her with a sense of justice loftier far than our own; and
however great the injustice whereof she may have been guilty, our
confidence will soon flow back to her, the first feeling of dismay
over; for in our heart we plead that she must have reasons we cannot
fathom, that there must be laws we cannot divine. The gloom of the
world would crush us were we to dissociate morality from fate. To doubt
the existence of this high, protecting justice and virtue, would seem
to us to be denying the existence of all justice and of all virtue.

We are no longer able to accept the narrow morality of positive
religion, which entices with reward and threatens with punishment; and
yet we are apt to forget that, were fate possessed of the most
rudimentary sense of justice, our conception of a lofty, disinterested
morality would fade into thin air. What merit in being just ourselves
if we be not convinced of the absolute injustice of fate? We no longer
believe in the ideals once held by saints, and we are confident that a
wise God will hold of as little account the duty done through hope of
recompense, as the evil done for sake of gain; and this even though the
recompense hoped for be nothing but the self-ensuing peace of mind. We
say that God, who must be at least as high as the highest thoughts He
has implanted in the best of men, will withhold His smile from those
who have desired but to please Him; and that they only who have done
good for the sake of good and as though He existed not, they only who
have loved virtue more than they loved God Himself, shall be allowed to
stand by His side. And yet, and for all this, no sooner does the event
confront us, than we discover that we still are guided by the "moral
maxims" of our childhood. Of more avail would be a "List of chastised
virtues." The soul that is quick with life would find its profit
therein; the cause of virtue would gain in vigour and in majesty. Let
us not forget that it is from the very nonmorality of destiny that a
nobler mo