Page:Dawn of the Day.pdf/410

374 witness for the truth of this assertion! In the meantime we still recall an old experience: two men as utterly different as Plato and Aristotle agreed with regard to the constituents of supreme happiness, (not only their own or that of humanity, but, in itself, even that of the gods with supreme felicity; they found it in knowledge, in the activity of a well-trained, inventive reason not in ‘intuition,” as the German semi- and out-and-out theologians ; nor in visions, as the mystics ; or in work, as all practical men do), Descartes and Spinoza held similar opinions. What great delight all these must have felt in knowledge! And how great a danger it implied for their honesty, lest they might thereby become panegyrists of the things! —How is it that the more conceivable the world has grown, the more all kinds of ceremonies have decreased? Is it that fear was so much the fundamental element of that awe which overcame us at everything unknown, mysterious, and taught us to fall on our knees before the inconceivable and pray for mercy? And may not the world, for the very reason that we have grown bolder, have lost some of its former charms? May not our own dignity and ceremoniousness, our own formidableness, have diminished together with our timorousness? Perhaps we think less of the world and ourselves since we more boldly think about it and ourselves? Perhaps there may be a future