Page 687 - of-human-bondage-

the absolute futility of the life which had just ended. It did
not matter if Cronshaw was alive or dead. It would have
been just as well if he had never lived. Philip thought of
Cronshaw young; and it needed an effort of imagination to
picture him slender, with a springing step, and with hair on
his head, buoyant and hopeful. Philip’s rule of life, to follow
one’s instincts with due regard to the policeman round the
corner, had not acted very well there: it was because Cron-
shaw had done this that he had made such a lamentable
failure of existence. It seemed that the instincts could not
be trusted. Philip was puzzled, and he asked himself what
rule of life was there, if that one was useless, and why people
acted in one way rather than in another. They acted accord-
ing to their emotions, but their emotions might be good or
bad; it seemed just a chance whether they led to triumph or
disaster. Life seemed an inextricable confusion. Men hur-
ried hither and thither, urged by forces they knew not; and
the purpose of it all escaped them; they seemed to hurry
just for hurrying’s sake.
Next morning Leonard Upjohn appeared with a small
wreath of laurel. He was pleased with his idea of crowning
the dead poet with this; and attempted, notwithstanding
Philip’s disapproving silence, to fix it on the bald head; but
the wreath fitted grotesquely. It looked like the brim of a hat
worn by a low comedian in a music-hall.
‘I’ll put it over his heart instead,’ said Upjohn.
‘You’ve put it on his stomach,’ remarked Philip.
Upjohn gave a thin smile.
‘Only a poet knows where lies a poet’s heart,’ he an-

Of Human Bondage