And yet he knew that in all probability this obedience would result in his own death.
Those who have lived much with nature will in some degree be familiar with such sensations, for man and nature are ever at variance, and each would shape the other to its ends.

In the issue nature wins.

Man boasts continually of his conquests over her, her instincts, her terrors, and her hopes.

But let him escape from out his cities and the fellowship of his kind, let him be alone with her for a while, and where is his supremacy?
He sinks back on to her breast again and is lost there as in time to be all his labours shall be lost.

The grass of the field and the sand of the desert are more powerful than Babylon; they were before her, they are after her; and so it is with everything physical and moral in their degrees, for here rules a nurse whom we human children must obey at last, however much we may defy her.
Thus brooded Leonard as he sat, his hands in his pockets and an empty pipe between his teeth.