“Yes; your own pride.”
“I have had but little pride this many a day. Arabin, you do not know what my life has been. How is a man to be proud who—” And then he stopped himself, not wishing to go through the catalogue of those grievances, which, as he thought, had killed the very germs of pride within him, or to insist by spoken words on his poverty, his wants, and the injustice of his position. “No; I wish I could be proud; but the world has been too heavy to me, and I have forgotten all that.”
“How long have I known you, Crawley?”
“How long? Ah dear! a life-time nearly, now.”
“And we were like brothers once.”
“Yes; we were equal as brothers then—in our fortunes, our tastes, and our modes of life.”
“And yet you would begrudge me the pleasure of putting my hand in my pocket, and relieving the inconveniences which have been thrown on you, and those you love better than yourself, by the chances of your fate in life.”
“I will live on no man’s charity,” said Crawley, with an abruptness which amounted almost to an expression of anger.
“And is not that pride?”
“No—yes;—it is a species of pride, but not that pride of which you spoke. A man cannot be honest if he have not some pride. You yourself;—would you not rather starve than become a beggar?”