Non-Fiction > Books > London, 1887 - Virginibus Puerisque, and other papers

102 Crabbed Age and Youth
you now see that they were partial. All
error, not merely verbal, is a strong way of
stating that the current truth is incomplete.
The follies of youth have a basis in sound
reason, just as much as the embarrassing
questions put by babes and sucklings. Their
most antisocial acts indicate the defects of
our society. When the torrent sweeps the
man against a boulder, you must expect him
to scream, and you need not be surprised if
the scream is sometimes a theory. Shelley,
chafing at the Church of England, discovered
the cure of all evils in universal atheism.
Generous lads irritated at the injustices of
society, see nothing for it but the abolish-
ment of everything and Kingdom Come of
anarchy. Shelley was a young fool ; so are
these cocksparrow revolutionaries. But it is
better to be a fool than to be dead. It is
better to emit a scream in the shape of a
theory than to be entirely insensible to the
jars and incongruities of life and take every-
thing as it comes in a forlorn stupidity.
Some people swallow the universe like a pill ;