---I've seen men whose
minds were always overflowing, and yet they did n't read much nor go much
into the world. Sometimes you'll find a bit of a pond-hole in a pasture,
and you'll plunge your walking-stick into it and think you are going to
touch bottom. But you find you are mistaken. Some of these little
stagnant pond-holes are a good deal deeper than you think; you may tie a
stone to a bed-cord and not get soundings in some of 'em. The country
boys will tell you they have no bottom, but that only means that they are
mighty deep; and so a good many stagnant, stupid-seeming people are a
great deal deeper than the length of your intellectual walking-stick, I
can tell you. There are hidden springs that keep the little pond-holes
full when the mountain brooks are all dried up. You poets ought to know
that.
--I can't help thinking you are more tolerant towards the specialists
than I thought at first, by the way you seemed to look at our dried-up
neighbor and his small pursuits.
--I don't like the word tolerant,--the Master said.---As long as the Lord
can tolerate me I think I can stand my fellow-creatures. Philosophically,
I love 'em all; empirically, I don't think I am very fond of all of 'em.
It depends on how you look at a man or a woman. Come here, Youngster,
will you? he said to That Boy.
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