Corydon sat with her hands clasped. “Yes,” she said, “that is the way she would feel!” “I’m glad to hear you say that,” remarked the other. “I must make it real; and I’ve been afraid about it. Would she really go with him?” “She would go if she loved him,” said Corydon. “If she loved him. But she must love his art still more.” “She must love _him,”_ said Corydon. Thyrsis shook his head. “It would not do for her to go with him for that,” he said. “Why not? Doesn’t he love her?” “Yes; but he is afraid to tell her so. They dare not let that sway them.” “I don’t understand. Why not?” “Because personal love is a limited thing, and comparatively an ignoble thing.” “I don’t see how there can be anything more noble than true love between a man and a woman,” declared Corydon. “It depends on what you mean by ‘true’ love,” replied Thyrsis. “If two people love each other for their own sakes, and go together, they soon come to know each other, and then they are satisfied--and their growth is at an end. What I conceive is that two people must lose themselves, and all thought of themselves, in their common love for something higher--for some great ideal, some purpose, some vision of perfection. And they seek this together, and they rejoice in finding it, each for the other; and so they have always progress and growth--they stand for something new to each other every day of their lives. To such love there is no end, and no chance of weariness or satiety.” “I had never thought of it just so,” said the girl. “But surely there must be a personal love in the beginning.” “I don’t know,” he responded. “I hadn’t thought about that. I’m afraid I’m impersonal by nature.” “Yes,” she said, “that’s what has puzzled me. Don’t you love human beings?” “Not as a rule,” he confessed. “But then--what is it you are interested in? Yourself?” “People tell me that’s the case. And there’s a sense in which it’s true--I’m wrapped up in the thought of myself as an art-work. I’ve a certain vision of the possibilities of my own being, and I’m trying to realize it. And if I do, then I can write books and communicate it to other people, so that they can judge it, and see if it’s any better than the vision they have. It is a higher kind of unselfishness, I think.” “I see,” said Corydon. “It’s not easy to understand.” “No one understands it,” he replied. “People are taught that they must sacrifice themselves for others; and they do it, blindly and stupidly, and never ask if the other person is worthy of the sacrifice--and still less if they themselves have anything worth sacrificing.” Corydon had clenched her hands suddenly. “How I hate the religion of self-sacrifice!” she cried. “Mine is a religion of self-development,” said Thyrsis. “I am sacrificing myself for what other people ought to be.”