Personally, I don't think it matters very much what you believe about the supernatural if you base your actions upon a sane view of what experience has shown to be best. To get and give as much happiness as possible seems to be our plain duty, and if abnormalities on a tremendous scale like this war crop up, it is the duty of every one to get to work and sacrifice, if necessary, his own chance of happiness in order to restore a state of things where happiness is possible for others. (By happiness, I mean contentment, usually temporary, with things as they are.) Experience has given us ample proof of where happiness is to be found as far as it can be realized in this life, and every one ought to be able to avoid those actions which would seem to bring happiness, but which have been shown by experience to result in the long run in dissatisfaction. Of course, very few are wise enough to accept the experience of others, and most men have to get stung many times over before they learn the lessons which countless billions before them learned in precisely the same way. Curiously enough, the highest happiness of which humans are capable seems to be found in the sacrifice of self. Maunsell's magnificent devotion to duty and splendid death are of far greater value to us than his continuing to live could have been, and though he could not have fully realized that fact himself, he certainly would not have been happy if he had declined the privilege of giving up his own happiness that general happiness might be secured for the world, thereby paradoxically finding the greatest happiness of all. If he still continues to live, and can look back on earthly experiences, he would probably not desire to change his own fate. You can see from all this that my desire to get back to the front is, in the main, selfish. I simply cannot be content to stay here handling a job which absorbs scarcely any of my ability or energy, and which could be as well or better done by some one who is not fit to fight. I went away from the front with the full intention of returning there with men whom I had trained to take their part in the scrap. I have been prevented by circumstances from carrying out my scheme, and I shall always regret that I did not consider that those who were actually at the front with me had a greater claim on me than any others. If I had stayed on, I should have got my commission and should have valued it much more than the one I actually did get. I might have been killed, but I was prepared for that, and I think there is no better way a man can die. It is comparatively seldom in the world's history that a man gets the chance to die splendidly. Most deaths are somewhat inglorious endings to not very glorious careers. A war like the present gives a man a chance to cancel at one stroke all the pettiness of his life.