Page:Man Who Laughs (Estes and Lauriat 1869) v2.djvu/74

54 lower orders. The reptiles called the poor had best keep quiet in their holes when they see anything out of the way. Quiescence is a power. Shut your eyes, if you have not the luck to be blind; stop up your ears, if you have not the good fortune to be deaf; hold your tongue, if you have not the good fortune to be mute. The great do what they like, the humble what they can. Let the mysterious pass unnoticed. Do not annoy the gods and goddesses. Do not interrogate appearances. Have a profound respect for idols. Do not gossip about the lessenings or increasings which take place in the upper regions, or about motives of which we are ignorant. Such things are mostly optical delusions to us inferior creatures. Metamorphoses are the business of the gods; the transformations and disorders of great persons who float above us are difficult to comprehend, and perilous to study. Too much attention irritates the Olympians engaged in their gyrations of amusement or fancy, and a thunderbolt may teach you that the bull you are too curiously examining is Jupiter. Do not lift the folds of the stone-coloured mantles of those terrible powers. Indifference is the truest wisdom. Do not stir, and you will be safe. Feign death, and they will not kill you. Therein lies the wisdom of the insect. Ursus practised it.

The tavern-keeper, who was puzzled as well, questioned Ursus one day. "Do you notice that Tom-Jim-Jack never comes here now?"

"Indeed!" said Ursus. "I had not remarked it."

Master Nicless made an observation in an undertone, no doubt touching on the intimacy between the ducal carriage and Tom-Jim-Jack,—a remark which, as it might have been irreverent and dangerous, Ursus took good care not to hear.

Still, Ursus was too much of an artist not to regret