Where No Fear Was | Page 5

it
has for burning. So long as we do not sin simply because we know the
laws of life which punish sin, we have not learned any hatred of sin; it
is only because we hate the punishment more than we love the sin, that
we abstain.
Socrates once said, in one of his wise paradoxes, that it was better to
sin knowingly than ignorantly. That is a hard saying, but it means that
at least if we sin knowingly, there is some purpose, some courage in the
soul. We take a risk with our eyes open, and our purpose may perhaps
be changed; whereas if we sin ignorantly, we do so out of a mere base
instinct, and there is no purpose that may be educated. Anyone who has
ever had the task of teaching boys or young men to write will know
how much easier it is to teach those who write volubly and exuberantly,
and desire to express themselves, even if they do it with many faults
and lapses of taste; taste and method may be corrected, if only the
instinct of expression is there. But the young man who has no impulse
to write, who says that he could think of nothing to say, it is impossible
to teach him much, because one cannot communicate the desire for
expression.
And the same holds good of life. Those who have strong vital impulses

can learn restraint and choice; but the people who have no particular
impulses and preferences, who just live out of mere impetus and habit,
who plod along, doing in a dispirited way just what they find to do, and
lapsing into indolence and indifference the moment that prescribed
work ceases, those are the spirits that afford the real problem, because
they despise activity, and think energy a mere exhibition of fussy
diffuseness.
But the generous, eager, wilful nature, who has always some aim in
sight, who makes mistakes perhaps, gives offence, collides high-
heartedly with others, makes both friends and enemies, loves and hates,
is anxious, jealous, self-absorbed, resentful, intolerant-- there is always
hope for such an one, for he is quick to despair, capable of shame, swift
to repent, and even when he is worsted and wounded, rises to fight
again. Such a nature, through pain and love, can learn to chasten his
base desires, and to choose the nobler and worthier way.
But what does really differentiate men and women is not their power of
fearing and suffering, but their power of caring and admiring. The only
real and vital force in the world is the force which attracts, the beauty
which is so desirable that one must imitate it if one can, the wisdom
which is so calm and serene that one must possess it if one may.
And thus all depends upon our discerning in the world a loving
intention of some kind, which holds us in view, and draws us to itself.
If we merely think of God and nature as an inflexible system of laws,
and that our only chance of happiness is to slip in and out of them, as a
man might pick his way among red-hot ploughshares, thankful if he can
escape burning, then we can make no sort of advance, because we can
have neither faith nor trust. The thing from which one merely flees can
have no real power over our spirit; but if we know God as a fatherly
Heart behind nature, who is leading us on our way, then indeed we can
walk joyfully in happiness, and undismayed in trouble; because
troubles then become only the wearisome incidents of the upward
ascent, the fatigue, the failing breath, the strained muscles, the
discomfort which is actually taking us higher, and cannot by any means
be avoided.
But fear is the opposite of all this; it is the dread of the unknown, the
ghastly doubt as to whether there is any goal before us or not; when we
fear, we are like the butterfly that flutters anxiously away from the boy

who pursues it, who means out of mere wantonness to strike it down
tattered and bruised among the grass- stems.

IV
VULNERABILITY

There have been many attempts in the history of mankind to escape
from the dominion of fear; the essence of fear, that which prompts it, is
the consciousness of our vulnerability. What we all dread is the disease
or the accident that may disable us, the loss of money or credit, the
death of those whom we love and whose love makes the sunshine of
our life, the anger and hostility and displeasure and scorn and ill-usage
of those about us. These are the definite things which the anxious mind
forecasts, and upon which it mournfully dwells.
The object then