?

I put my hand into my pocket, and wrought sixpennyworth of miracle.

It took me half an hour to recover my quiet mind. After all, it is as
idle to rage against man's fatuity as to hope that he will ever be less a
fool. For me, the great thing was my sixpenny miracle. Why, I have
known the day when it would have been beyond my power altogether, or else
would have cost me a meal. Wherefore, let me again be glad and thankful.



IV.


There was a time in my life when, if I had suddenly been set in the
position I now enjoy, conscience would have lain in ambush for me. What!
An income sufficient to support three or four working-class families--a
house all to myself--things beautiful wherever I turn--and absolutely
nothing to do for it all! I should have been hard put to it to defend
myself. In those days I was feelingly reminded, hour by hour, with what
a struggle the obscure multitudes manage to keep alive. Nobody knows
better than I do _quam parvo liceat producere vitam_. I have hungered in
the streets; I have laid my head in the poorest shelter; I know what it
is to feel the heart burn with wrath and envy of "the privileged
classes." Yes, but all that time I was one of "the privileged" myself,
and now I can accept a recognized standing among them without shadow of
self-reproach.

It does not mean that my larger sympathies are blunted. By going to
certain places, looking upon certain scenes, I could most effectually
destroy all the calm that life has brought me. If I hold apart and
purposely refuse to look that way, it is because I believe that the world
is better, not worse, for having one more inhabitant who lives as becomes
a civilized being. Let him whose soul prompts him to assail the iniquity
of things, cry and spare not; let him who has the vocation go forth and
combat. In me it would be to err from Nature's guidance. I know, if I
know anything, that I am made for the life of tranquillity and
meditation. I know that only thus can such virtue as I posses