He sate one day in the ante-chapel of his old college, through a morning service, listening, as in a dream, to the sweet singing within; it seemed but a day since he had sate in his stall, a fitful-hearted boy. The service ended, and the procession streamed out, the rich tints of the windows lighting up the faces and the white surplices of the men, old and young, that issued from the dark door of the screen. Hugh felt within himself that he would not have the old days back again even if he could; he was nothing but grateful for the balance, the serenity, that life had brought him. He was conscious of greater strength, undimmed energy, increased zest; faltering indeed he was still, not better, not more unselfish; but he had a sense of truer values, more proportion, more contentment. The mysteries of life were as dark as ever, but at least he no longer thought that he had the key; in those days his little rickety system of life, that trembled in every breeze, had seemed for him to bridge all gaps, to explain all mysteries. Now indeed chaos stretched all about him, full of huge mists, dark chasms, hidden echoes; but he perceived something of its vastness and immensity; he had broken down the poor frail fences of his soul, and was in contact with reality. He did not doubt that he seemed to the younger generation an elderly and sombre personage, stumbling down the dark descent of life, with youth and brightness behind him; but that descent appeared to himself to be rather an upward-rising road, over dim mountains, the air glowing about him with some far-off sunrise. Poetry, art, religion--they meant a thousandfold more to him than they had meant in the old days. They had been pretty melodies, deft tricks of hand, choice toys then. Now they were exultations, agonies, surrenders, triumphs. The prospect of life had been to him in those days like misty ranges, full of threatening precipices, and dumb valleys in which no foot had trod. Now he saw from the hill-brow, a broad and goodly land full of wood and pasture, clustered hamlets, glittering, smoke-wrapt towns, rivers widening to the sea; the horizons closed by the blue hills of hope, from which life and love, and even death itself, seemed to wave hands of welcome ere they dipped to the unseen. He blessed God for that; and best of all he had now no desire, as he had had in the old days, to be understood, to be felt, to claim a place, to exercise an influence. He had put all that aside; his only concern was now to step as swiftly, as strongly as possible, upon the path that opened before him, caring little whether it led on to grassy moorlands, or sheltered valleys full of wood, or even to the towered walls of some strong city of God. XI Platonism--The Pure Gospel--The Pauline Gospel--The Harmony