The Crime of Henry Vane: A Study with a Moral

Synopsis

John shrugged his shoulders and began. Of course, I do not mean that he told the whole story just as I have written it. He related the bare facts, with little comment and without conversations. Whether you condemned the man or excused him, John thought, his story might be understood, even if his folly were not forgiven. The crowd at the club did neither; and, perhaps, their judgment is the judgment of the world; and the world is probably right. But we may learn from folly; it is sometimes more suggestive than common sense. There is the ordinary success and there is the exceptional failure; that is pleasanter, but this is more instructive. Extreme cases fix the law.

The world is probably right; and, to those of us who are healthily adapted to our environment, the world is enough. Blessed are they who are fitted, for they shall survive. The world is enough; but the poet sang, love is enough. Shall we say, love is surplusage? The world is always right; and how virtuously the healthy world reproves what is morbid! How all the world unites in condemning him who is not fully content with itself! For such an one it cannot even spare its pity. There is a kind of personal animus in its contempt.

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