He found that sex morality was
regarded by some as a useful taboo; psychology taught him that
repression could be as harmful as excess; the collapse of the
Darwinian optimists, who believed that all curves were upward,
left him with the inner conviction that everything, including
principle, was in a state of flux. And his intellectual guides,
first Shaw, and then, when Shaw became _vieux jeu_, De Gourmont,
favored that conclusion.
Then came the war, which at a stroke destroyed his sense of
security and with that his respect for the older generation that
had guaranteed his world. Propaganda first enlightened him as to
the evil meanings of imperialistic politics, and afterward left
him suspicious of all politics. Cruelty and violent change became
familiar. He had seen civilization disintegrate on the
battlefield, and was prepared to find it shaky at home.
Then he resumed, or began, his reading and his writing. His
reading of fiction and poetry, especially when it dealt with
youth, irritated him. The pictures of life in Dickens, in "The
Idylls of the King," in the Henty books, in the popular romantic
novels and the conventional social studies, did not correspond
with his pictures.
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