There are times--surely we all know them--when the injustices of life,
of the individual destiny, seem more than can be silently endured. “Why
should this? and this? and this be?” we ask. “To what end such
superfluous happiness heaped upon one head, such equally uncalled-for
refusals of it consigned to another? What does it mean? or who is the
better for such unendurable partiality?”
The question is the oldest of all questions, yet it is the question of
to-day, as it will be the question of to-morrow, and of many more
to-morrows. Job asked it about himself, as some of us ask it about those
whom we know to be infinitely better than ourselves. Moreover it is not
alone the apparent injustice of a life as a whole, but of the several
parts of it, that we murmur at. There are acts of courage, of silent
endurance, of unrecognised heroism, which only need to be performed in
some more conspicuous fashion, or upon a larger field, to awaken the
whole world to admiration. Yet they pass away unnoticed; oblivion
enshrouds them, and they are never so much as heard of.
When such suppressions, such seeming injustices, occur at the beginning
of things, while the sun is still high, and Time seems a friendly
factor, one is able to reassure oneself. One says--“Wait a little
longer!” “The time will come!” When such illusion, however, is no longer
possible; when the sands have run out, or been scattered in mid-career;
what is one to say _then_? What faith, what philosophy, what stoicism,
or what mixture of all three, will enable one to accept it without
complaint?