The defects in such a character superficial critics ascribe to an excess of the intellectual faculties. It is truer to say that they are due, not indeed to an atrophy of these, but to a limitation of them. No man, for instance, worked in an atmosphere more purely intellectual than St. Thomas Aquinas, yet his most general judgments upon the principles of government stand as firm as Aristotle’s, upon which they are based and which they complete. That supreme intelligence also affirmed the “General Will.” The excellences, again, of such a character as Lafayette’s are by many imagined to belong, and would certainly have been by himself ascribed, to the dominating power of reason. If we look closely, it is not so. Between his strong convictions--and they were shared by countless thousands--whether in religion or in civic theory, between such theories, I say, and the expression of them in life lies the function of the will. The great [Illustration: MARIE JEAN PAUL ROCH YVES GILBERT MOTIER, MARQUIS DE LAFAYETTE _To face p. 164_ ] glory of such characters as Lafayette’s lies in this, that though their intellects may not have had the strength to grasp transcendental things or to perceive the complexity of the material with which a politician must deal, yet an unswerving determination to do what their conscience dictates is discoverable throughout their lives. No greater thing can be said of any man; and it is not upon the moral side, but rather upon the reasonable, that such characters fail. Those who affirm the fate of the soul to depend upon right action within its lights will be secure of such men’s salvation. PART FIVE UNDER THE MILL OF VALMY INTRODUCTION