as an addiction not more serious in its effects upon character than the practice of playing golf, a thing in which a leisurely person might immerse himself, and cultivate a decent sense of self-importance.  But Amroth showed me that the danger of it lay in the tendency to consider the intellect to be the basis of all life and progress.  “The intellectual man,” he said, “is inclined to confuse his own acute perception of the movement of thought with the originating impulse of that movement.  But of course thought is a thing which ebbs and flows, like public opinion, according to its own laws, and is not originated but only perceived by men of intellectual ability.  The danger of it is a particularly arid sort of self-conceit.  It is as if the Lady of Shalott were to suppose that she created life by observing and rendering it in her magic web, whereas her devotion to her task simply isolates her from the contact with other minds and hearts, which is the one thing worth having.  That is, of course, the danger of the artist as well as of the philosopher.  They both stand aside from the throng, and are so much absorbed in the aspect of thought and emotion that they do not realise that they are separated from it.  They are consequently spared, when they come here, the punishment which falls upon those who have mixed greedily, selfishly, and cruelly with life, of which you will have a sight before long.  But that place of punishment is not nearly so sad or depressing a place as the paradise of delight, and the paradise of intellect, because the sufferers have no desire to stay there, can repent and feel ashamed, and therefore can suffer, which is always hopeful.  But the artistic and intellectual have really starved their capacity for suffering, the one by treating all emotion as spectacular, and the other by treating it as a puerile interruption to serious things.  It takes people a long time to work their way out of self-satisfaction!  But there is another curious place I wish you to visit.  It is a dreadful place in a way, but by no means consciously unhappy,” and Amroth pointed to a great building which stood on a slope of the hill above the forest, with a wide and beautiful view from it.  Before very long we came to a high stone wall with a gate carefully guarded.  Here Amroth said a few words to a porter, and we went up through a beautiful terraced park.  In the park we saw little knots of people walking aimlessly about, and a few more solitary figures.  But in each case they were accompanied by people whom I saw to be warders.  We passed indeed close to an elderly man, rather fantastically dressed, who looked possessed with a kind of flighty cheerfulness.  He was talking to himself with odd, emphatic gestures, as if he were ticking off the points of a speech.  He came up to us and made us an effusive greeting, praising the situation and convenience of the place, and wishing us a pleasant sojourn.  He then was silent for a moment, and added, “Now there is