Amid the beauty of these dear spots on Chestnut Hill, in the heart of these four crossing ways, I have seen new things; not that any new things have happened, but because I have opened my eyes. I am rewarded, I the lowest, for being the only one of all to follow up error to the end, right into its holy places; for I am at last disentangling all the simplicity and truth of the great horizons. The revelation still seems to me so terrible that the silence of men, heaped under the roofs down there at my feet, seizes and threatens me. And if I am but timidly formulating it within myself, that is because each of us has lived in reality more than his life, and because my training has filled me, like the rest, with centuries of shadow, of humiliation and captivity. It is establishing itself cautiously; but it is the truth, and there are moments when logic seizes you in its godlike whirlwind. In this disordered world where the weakness of a few oppresses the strength of all; since ever the religion of the God of Battles and of Resignation has not sufficed by itself to consecrate inequality. Tradition reigns, the gospel of the blind adoration of what was and what is--God without a head. Man's destiny is eternally blockaded by two forms of tradition; in time, by hereditary succession; in space, by frontiers, and thus it is crushed and annihilated in detail. It is the truth. I am certain of it, for I am touching it. But I do not know what will become of us. All the blood poured out, all the words poured out, to impose a sham ideal on our bodies and souls, will they suffice for a long time yet to separate and isolate humanity in absurdity made real? History is a Bible of errors. I have not only seen blessings falling from on high on all which supported evil, and curses on all which could heal it; I have seen, here below, the keepers of the moral law hunted and derided, from little Termite, lost like a rat in unfolding battle, back to Jesus Christ. We go away. For the first time since I came back I no longer lean on Marie. It is she who leans on me. * * * * * * CHAPTER XXI NO! The opening of our War Museum, which was the conspicuous event of the following days, filled Crillon with delight. It was a wooden building, gay with flags, which the municipality had erected; and Room 1 was occupied by an exhibition of paintings and drawings by amateurs in high society, all war subjects. Many of them were sent down from Paris. Crillon, officially got up in his Sunday clothes, has bought the catalogue (which is sold for the benefit of the wounded) and he is struck with wonder by the list of exhibitors. He talks of titles, of coats of arms, of crowns; he seeks enlightenment in matters of aristocratic hierarchy. Once, as he stands before the row of frames, he asks: "I say, now, which has got most talent in France--a princess or a duchess?"