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It is generally believed that legends are found only at the dawn of history, in the poetic period; that is a great mistake; the legend the legend that deceives, that deforms, that misdirects is everywhere, in all ages, in the present as in the past in the present even more than in the past, because it is the consequence of certain universal forms of thought and of sentiment.
Without it he misdirects his own movements, and mistakes continually the orders of his superintending workman. A boy who has been to a good common school, and has had his mental activities quickened, and whose mind has been stimulated and roused by worthy motives, not only will be more industrious for it when he becomes a man, but his industry will be more effective.
The effect of this is depraving: it contracts the soul, misdirects its energies, and blunts the edge of its spiritual sensibility. The sentiment we are wishing to inculcate will furnish us with consolation amidst adversities, and reconcile the spirit to bereaving dispensations.
If any one really thinks that the current theology involves depraved notions of the supreme impersonation of good, restricts and narrows the intelligence, misdirects the religious imagination, and has become powerless to guide conduct, then how does the circumstance that it happens not to be wholly and unredeemedly bad in its influence, relieve our dissident from all care or anxiety as to the points in which, as we have seen, he does count it inadequate and mischievous?
The result of our inquiry is less alarming than it looks at first sight. Knowledge is valuable for action, and error is chiefly hurtful in so far as it misdirects conduct.
That their traffic in mere words disables some literary men from comprehending facts is shown by Mr. Shaw's play upon the word "Junkerism." He points to the dictionary definition of the word instead of to the fact it represents, and by this verbal juggling tries to convince his readers that the military autocracy that dominates and misdirects Germany has its counterpart and equal in Great Britain.
He stands at the end, white and glorious, with his eyes steadfastly measuring his antagonist and calculating upon what will be his next move if the sling misdirects the stone. Of the objection to the statue as being not representative of the Biblical figure I have said something in the chapter on the Bargello, where several Davids come under review.