Page:Dawn of the Day.pdf/349

Rh then ure our “neighbours” to us? We grow lonelier for the very reason that the whole flood of humanity is surging round us. The fire within us, which is glowing for all that is human, is ever on the increase—wherefore we look upon all that surrounds us as though it had become more indifferent, more shadowy. But our cold glance offends! —”The rule always seems to me more interesting than the exception.”’ Whoever feels thus is far advanced in knowledge and one of the initiated. —Gradually I have come to see daylight in the general deficiency of our culture and education: nobody learns, nobody strives after, nobody teaches—how to endure solitude. —Because we see through a thing we think that, in future, it will be unable to offer us any resistance whatever—and we are surprised it finding that we are able to see through it, and yet unable to run through it. This foolish sensation and surprise are similar to the sensation which a fly experiences before a window-pane.