The most terrible creation of all

I’ve just finished reading Susan Cooper’s The Dark is Rising sequence. I enjoyed it very much (who doesn’t enjoy tales of good triumphing over bad?) and this passage in particular resonated with me:

Gwion sighed. “So the Dark did a simple thing,” he said. “They showed the maker of the sword his own uncertainty and fear. Fear of having done the wrong thing – fear that having done this one great thing, he would never again be able to accomplish anything of great worth – fear of age, of insufficiency, of unmet promise. All such endless fears, that are the doom of people given the gift of making, and lie always somewhere in their minds. And gradually, he was put into despair. Fear grew in him, and he escaped from it into lethargy – and so hope died, and a terrible paralysing melancholy took its place. He is held by it now, he is held captive by his own mind. He, and the sword Eirias that he made; with him. Despair holds him prisoner, despair, the most terrible creation of all. For in great men, the mind can produce giant spectres of great power. And King Gwyddno is a great man.”

From Silver on the Tree, by Susan Cooper (p.708, part of The Dark is Rising sequence, Puffin books, 1984, p. 708).