Things had fallen out so. In his mind was something else--the
expression of his own purpose.
McGregor rose and went out of the saloon. In the street men stood
about in groups. At Thirty-ninth Street a crowd of youths scuffling on
the sidewalk pushed against the tall muttering man who passed with his
hat in his hand. He began to feel that he was in the midst of
something too vast to be moved by the efforts of any one man. The
pitiful insignificance of the individual was apparent. As in a long
procession the figures of the individuals who had tried to rise out of
the ruck of American life passed before him. With a shudder he
realised that for the most part the men whose names filled the pages
of American history meant nothing. The children who read of their
deeds were unmoved. Perhaps they had only increased the disorder. Like
the men passing in the street they went across the face of things and
disappeared into the darkness.
"Perhaps Finley and Ormsby are right," he whispered. "They get what
they can, they have the good sense to know that life runs quickly like
a flying bird passing an open window. They know that if a man thinks
of anything else he is likely to become another sentimentalist and
spend his life being hypnotised by the wagging of his own jaw.
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