"Perfacile angustis tolerabant finibus aevom," (In narrow bounds an easy life endured).
But for those whose perceptions were keen, who lived upon joy, from the very constitution of their nature, how were such natures--and he knew that he was of the number--to avoid sinking into the mire of the Slough of Despond, how were they to rejoice in the valley of humiliation? What was to be their well in the vale of misery? How were the pools to be filled with water?
The answer seemed to be that it could only be achieved by work, by effort, by prayer. If one had definite work in hand, it carried one over these languid intervals. How often had the idea of setting to work in these listless moods seemed intolerable; yet how soon one forgot oneself in the exercise of congenial labour! Here came in the worth of effort, that one could force oneself to the task, commit oneself to the punctual discharge of an unwelcome duty. And if even that failed, then one could cast oneself into an inner region, in the spirit of the Psalmist, when he said, "Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it." One could fling one's prayer into the dark void, as the sailors from a sinking ship shoot a rocket with a rope attached to the land, and then, as they haul it in, feel with joy the rope strain tight, and know that it has found a hold.
Hugh felt that such experience as this, experience, that is, in the vital force of prayer, might be called a subjective experience, and could not be put to a scientific test. But for all that, there was nothing which of late years had so grown upon him as the consciousness of the effectiveness of a certain kind of prayer. This was not a mechanical repetition of verbal forms, but a strong and secret uplifting of the heart to the Father of all. There were moments when one seemed baffled and powerless, when one's own strength seemed utterly unequal to the burden; prayer on such occasions did not necessarily bring a perfect serenity and joy, though there were times when it brought even that; but it brought sufficient strength; it made the difficult, the dreaded thing possible. Hugh had proved this a hundred times over, and the marvel to him was that he did not use it more; but the listless mind sometimes could not brace itself to the effort; and then it seemed to Hugh that he was as one who lay thirsting, with water in reach of his nerveless hand. Still there were few things of which he was so absolutely certain as he was of the abounding strength of prayer; it seemed to reveal a dim form moving behind the veil of things, which in the moment of entreaty seemed to suspend its progress, to stop, to draw near, to smile. Why the gifts from that wise hand were often such difficult things, stones for bread, serpents for fish, Hugh could not divine. But he tended less and less to ask for precise things, but to pray in the spirit of the old Dorian prayer that what was good might be given him, even if he did not perceive it to be good, and that what was evil might be withheld, even if he desired it.