Page:The forerunners.djvu/50

48 for you. You are one of the rare persons whose soul has remained unaffected by the madness of this war. It is a delight to me to know that you have continued to cherish the best principles of humanity.… Allow me, from a great distance, to clasp you by the hand, dear comrade.

… Will you permit me to make a friendly remark? I am a trifle uneasy as to some of the names mentioned in your letter, uneasy as to the effect upon children's minds. You propose to put before them such formidable examples as that of Moses. Your aim, obviously, is to impress on them the importance of moral energy, which is the source of all light. But it is not a matter of indifference whether this light be turned towards the past or towards the future. There is no lack of moral energy to-day. The quality abounds, but it is devoted to the service of an obsolete ideal, an ideal which oppresses and kills. I must admit that I am somewhat estranged from the great men of the past, considered as examples for the conduct of life. For the most part I am disappointed in them. I admire them on aesthetic grounds, but I cannot endure the intolerance and the fanaticism they so often display. Many of the gods whom they worshipped have to-day become dangerous idols. Mankind, I fear, will fail to fulfil its lofty destiny unless it can transcend these earlier ideals, unless it prove able to offer wider horizons to the coming generations. In a word, I love and admire the past; but I wish the future to excel the past. It can; it must.…