Page:Rolland - People's Theater.djvu/148

130 We must also be careful not to remain merely the singers of the past. The new energy we shall generate must not be allowed to stand idle. Action must spring from the spectacle of action. Once we have gathered our forces and become conscious of our power, let us march forward! Armed with all the greatness of the past, we shall strive to create the new man, a man of stalwart moral fiber and of truth. The story of past heroism, such as I have described it, is not a lantern hung from the rear end of a train, casting an uncertain light over the road that has been traveled; it is a lighthouse in the night, marking the position of the ship in the ocean, whence it comes and whither it is going. Separated from the past, the present has no meaning, just as the past is without significance apart from the present. Both past and present must unite to give meaning to the greatest thing of all: Life. The life of all time must be consolidated into a unified whole, one being with a thousand bodies, and strive from every direction to attack the universe, which some day it will dominate.