Free The Secret Places of the Heart by H. G. Wells

as if it were a plain
matter of fact. Plain matter of fact, that we are only incidentally
ourselves. That really each one of us is also the whole species, is
really indeed all life."
    "A part of it."
    "An integral part-as sight is part of a man... with no absolute
separation from all the rest—no more than a separation of the
imagination. The whole so far as his distinctive quality goes. I do not
know how this takes shape in your mind, Sir Richmond, but to me this
idea of actually being life itself upon the world, a special phase of it
dependent upon and connected with all other phases, and of being one
of a small but growing number of people who apprehend that, and want to
live in the spirit of that, is quite central. It is my fundamental idea.
We,—this small but growing minority—constitute that part of life which
knows and wills and tries to rule its destiny. This new realization, the
new psychology arising out of it is a fact of supreme importance in the
history of life. It is like the appearance of self-consciousness in some
creature that has not hitherto had self-consciousness. And so far as we
are concerned, we are the true kingship of the world. Necessarily. We
who know, are the true king....I wonder how this appeals to you. It
is stuff I have thought out very slowly and carefully and written and
approved. It is the very core of my life.... And yet when one comes
to say these things to someone else, face to face.... It is much more
difficult to say than to write."
    Sir Richmond noted how the doctor's chair creaked as he rolled to and
fro with the uneasiness of these intimate utterances.
    "I agree," said Sir Richmond presently. "One DOES think in this fashion.
Something in this fashion. What one calls one's work does belong to
something much bigger than ourselves.
    "Something much bigger," he expanded.
    "Which something we become," the doctor urged, "in so far as our work
takes hold of us."
    Sir Richmond made no answer to this for a little while. "Of course we
trail a certain egotism into our work," he said.
    "Could we do otherwise? But it has ceased to be purely egotism. It is
no longer, 'I am I' but 'I am part.'... One wants to be an honourable
part."
    "You think of man upon his planet," the doctor pursued. "I think of
life rather as a mind that tries itself over in millions and millions of
trials. But it works out to the same thing."
    "I think in terms of fuel," said Sir Richmond.
    He was still debating the doctor's generalization. "I suppose it would
be true to say that I think of myself as mankind on his planet, with
very considerable possibilities and with only a limited amount of fuel
at his disposal to achieve them. Yes.... I agree that I think in that
way.... I have not thought much before of the way in which I think about
things—but I agree that it is in that way. Whatever enterprises mankind
attempts are limited by the sum total of that store of fuel upon the
planet. That is very much in my mind. Besides that he has nothing but
his annual allowance of energy from the sun."
    "I thought that presently we were to get unlimited energy from atoms,"
said the doctor.
    "I don't believe in that as a thing immediately practicable. No doubt
getting a supply of energy from atoms is a theoretical possibility,
just as flying was in the time of Daedalus; probably there were actual
attempts at some sort of glider in ancient Crete. But before we get
to the actual utilization of atomic energy there will be ten thousand
difficult corners to turn; we may have to wait three or four thousand
years for it. We cannot count on it. We haven't it in hand. There may be
some impasse. All we have surely is coal and oil,—there is no surplus
of wood now—only an annual growth. And water-power is income also,
doled out day by day. We cannot anticipate it. Coal and oil are our only
capital. They are all we have for great important efforts. They are a
gift to mankind to use to some supreme end or to waste in trivialities.
Coal is the