Hugh saw that in choosing the work of one's life, one must not be guided by necessity, or even mere rectitude. Work embraced from a sense of duty was like driving a chariot in sea-sand. One must have an enthusiasm for one's task, and a delight in it; for only by enjoyment of the results could one tolerate the mechanical labour inseparable from all intellectual toil. It was true that he had himself drifted into official duties, but here Hugh saw the guidance of a very tender providence, which had provided him with a species of discipline that he could never have spontaneously practised. His great need had been the application of some hardening and hammering process, such as should give him that sort of concentrated alertness which his education had failed to bestow; and none the less tenderly provided, it seemed to Hugh, was the irresistible impulse to arise and go, which had come upon him when the process was completed. And now he was free, with an immense appetite for speculation, for intellectual pleasure, for the criticism of life, for observation. It was the quality, the fine essence of things and thoughts that mattered. To some was given the desire to organise and manage the world, to others the instinct for perception, for analysis, for the development of ideas. It was not that one kind of work was better than the other; both were needed, both were noble; but Hugh had no doubt on which side of the battle he was himself meant to fight. And so he determined that he would devote his life to the work, and that he would not allow any excessive intrusion of extraneous elements. The blessing of the academical life was that it entailed a certain amount of social intercourse; it compelled one to come into contact with a large variety of people. Without this Hugh felt that his outlook would have become narrow and self-centred. He knew of course that there would be times when it would seem to him that his life was an ineffective one, when he would envy the men of affairs, when he would wonder what, after all, his own performance amounted to. But Hugh felt that the great lack of many lives was the failure to perceive the interest of ideas; that many men and women went through existence in a dull and mechanical way, raking together the straws and dust of the street; and he thought that a man might do a great work if he could put a philosophy of life into an accessible shape. The great need was the need of simplification; the world was full of palpitating interests, of beauty, of sweetness, of delight. But many people had no criterion of values; they filled their lives with petty engagements, and smilingly lamented that they had no time to think or read. For such people the sun rose over dewy fields, in the freshness of the countryside, in vain: in vain the sunset glared among the empurpled cloud-banks; in vain the moon rose pale over the hushed garden-walks, while the nightingale, hidden in the dark heart of the bush, broke into