open to question; therefore, the present-day religions can only with the greatest difficulty close their eyes to this fact; for not only has the intense interest been diverted from the Christian religion, but criticism and the necessary correction have increased correspondingly. The Christian religion seems to have fulfilled its great biological purpose, in so far as we are able to judge. It has led human thought to independence, and has lost its significance, therefore, to a yet undetermined extent; in any case its dogmatic contents have become related to Mithracism. In consideration of the fact that this religion has rendered, nevertheless, inconceivable service to education, one cannot reject it "eo ipso " today. It seems to me that we might still make use in some way of its form of thought, and especially of its great wisdom of life, which for two thousand years has been proven to be particularly efficacious. The stumbling block is the unhappy combination of religion and morality. That must be overcome. There still remain traces of this strife in the soul, the lack of which in a human being is reluctantly felt. It is hard to say in what such things consist; for this, ideas as well as words are lacking. If, in spite of that, I attempt to say something about it, I do it parabolically, using Seneca's words: “

"Nothing can be more commendable and beneficial if you persevere in the pursuit of wisdom. It is what would be ridiculous to wish for when it is in your power to attain it. There is no need to lift up your hands to Heaven, or to pray the servant of the temple to admit you to the ear of the idol that your prayers may be heard the better. God is near thee; he is with thee. Yes, Lucilius, a holy spirit resides within us, the observer of

good and evil, and our constant guardian. And as we treat him, he treats us; no good man is without a God. Could any one ever rise above the power of fortune without his assistance? It is he that inspires us with thoughts, upright, just and pure. We do not, indeed, pretend to say what God; but that a God dwells in the breast of every good man is certain."

CHAPTER IV

THE SONG OF THE MOTH

A LITTLE later Miss Miller travelled from Geneva to Paris. She says:

"My weariness on the railway was so great that I could hardly sleep an hour. It was terrifically hot in the ladies' carriage."

At four o'clock in the morning she noticed a moth that flew against the light in her compartment. She then tried to go to sleep again. Suddenly the following poem took possession of her mind.

The Moth to the Sun

"I longed for thee when first I crawled to consciousness.
My dreams were all of thee when in the chrysalis I lay.
Oft myriads of my kind beat out their lives
Against some feeble spark once caught from thee.
And one hour more-and my poor life is gone;
Yet my last effort, as my first desire, shall be
But to approach thy glory; then, having gained
One raptured glance, I'll die content.
For I, the source of beauty, warmth and life
Have in his perfect splendor once beheld."

Before we go into the material which Miss Miller offers us for the understanding of the poem, we will again cast a glance over the psychologic situation in which the poem originated. Some months or weeks appear to

have elapsed since the last direct manifestation of the unconscious that Miss Miller reported to us; about this period we have had no information. We learn nothing about the moods and phantasies of this time. If one might draw a conclusion from this silence it would be presumably that in the time which elapsed between the two poems, really nothing of importance had happened, and that, therefore, this poem is again but a voiced fragment of the unconscious working of the complex stretching out over months and years. It is highly probable that it is concerned with the same complex as before.1 The earlier product, a hymn of creation full of hope, has, however, but little similarity to the present poem. The poem lying before us has a truly hopeless, melancholy character; moth and sun, two things which never meet. One must in fairness ask, is a moth really expected to rise to the sun? We know indeed the proverbial saying about the moth that flew into the light and singed its wings, but not the legend of the moth that strove towards the sun. Plainly, here, two things are connected in her thoughts that do not belong together; first, the moth which fluttered around the light so long that it burnt itself; and then, the idea of a small ephemeral being, something like the day fly, which, in lamentable contrast to the eternity of the stars, longs for an imperishable daylight. This idea reminds one of Faust:

"Mark how, beneath the evening sunlight's glow
The green-embosomed houses glitter;
The glow retreats, done is the day of toil,
It yonder hastes, new fields of life exploring;

Ah, that no wing can lift me from the soil
Upon its track to follow, follow soaring!
Then would I see eternal Evening gild
The silent world beneath me glowing..
Yet, finally, the weary god is sinking;
The new-born impulse fires my mind,-
I hasten on, his beams eternal drinking,
The day before me and the night behind,

Above me heaven unfurled, the floor of waves beneath me,—
A glorious dream! though now the glories fade.

Alas! the wings that lift the mind no aid

Of wings to lift the body can bequeath me."

Not long afterwards, Faust sees "the black dog roving there through cornfields and stubble," the dog who is the same as the devil, the tempter, in whose hellish fires Faust has singed his wings. When he believed that he was expressing his great longing for the beauty of the sun and the earth, "he went astray thereover" and fell into the hands of "the Evil One."

"Yes, resolute to reach some brighter distance,
On earth's fair sun I turn my back."

This is what Faust had said shortly before, in true recognition of the state of affairs. The honoring of the beauty of nature led the Christian of the Middle Ages to pagan thoughts which lay in an antagonistic relation to his conscious religion, just as once Mithracism was in threatening competition with Christianity, for Satan often disguises himself as an angel of light.2

The longing of Faust became his ruin. The longing for the Beyond had brought as a consequence a loathing for life, and he stood on the brink of self-destruction.3