The fact
exists. It is as clear as noonday. We owe this to the writers who
have given such beautiful pictures of our native land and military
renown, and to the schoolmasters, who have instilled their words into
the souls of the people. Marvellous power of language, which can
incite a prosaic peasant lad to sacrifice life joyfully for an abstract
idea, a fancy."
These were his thoughts,--it can neither be denied nor palliated. But
while they darted clearly and swiftly through his brain, he felt a
mental agitation which surprised and bewildered him. It was a strange
perplexity; he felt ashamed and embarrassed; it seemed as though he had
uttered his thoughts aloud, and a group of people with grave, noble
faces had listened, and were now gazing at him in silence, but with
mingled compassion and contempt. From inaccessible depths of his soul,
into which his sober, critical, mocking reason did not shine, a
mysterious voice appeared to rise, imperiously commanding his
scepticism to be silent. "I am right!" reason ventured to murmur.
"You are wrong!" thundered the voice from the depths.
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