His thought was a mixture of strange superstitions and sound sense: sometimes it surprised Christophe: but now it was only too dear to him. They said no more until they left the cemetery. When they had closed the creaking gate, and were walking along the wall through the cold fields, waking from slumber, by the little path which led them under the cypress trees from which the snow was dropping, Christophe began to weep. "Oh! uncle," he said, "how wretched I am!" He dared not speak of his experience in love, from an odd fear of embarrassing or hurting Gottfried: but he spoke of his shame, his mediocrity, his cowardice, his broken vows. "What am I to do, uncle? I have tried, I have struggled: and after a year I am no further on than before. Worse: I have gone back. I am good for nothing. I am good for nothing! I have ruined my life. I am perjured!..." They were walking up the hill above the town. Gottfried said kindly: "Not for the last time, my boy. We do not do what we will to do. We will and we live: two things. You must be comforted. The great thing is, you see, never to give up willing and living. The rest does not depend on us." Christophe repeated desperately: "I have perjured myself." "Do you hear?" said Gottfried. (The cocks were crowing in all the countryside.) "They, too, are crowing for another who is perjured. They crow for every one of us, every morning." "A day will come," said Christophe bitterly, "when, they will no longer crow for me ... A day to which there is no to-morrow. And what shall I have made of my life?" "There is always a to-morrow," said Gottfried. "But what can one do, if willing is no use?" "Watch and pray." "I do not believe." Gottfried smiled. "You would not be alive if you did not believe. Every one believes. Pray." "Pray to what?" Gottfried pointed to the sun appearing on the horizon, red and frozen. "Be reverent before the dawning day. Do not think of what will be in a year, or in ten years. Think of to-day. Leave your theories. All theories, you see, even those of virtue, are bad, foolish, mischievous. Do not abuse life. Live in to-day. Be reverent towards each day. Love it, respect it, do not sully it, do not hinder it from coming to flower. Love it even when it is gray and sad like to-day. Do not be anxious. See. It is winter now. Everything is asleep. The good earth will awake again. You have only to be good and patient like the earth. Be reverent. Wait. If you are good, all will go well. If you are not, if you are weak, if you do not succeed, well, you must be happy in that. No doubt it is the best you can do. So, then, why _will_? Why be angry because of what you cannot do? We all have to do what we can.... _Als ich kann._" "It is not enough," said Christophe, making a face. Gottfried laughed pleasantly.