"And why didn't you do it? Because, like Hamlet, you hadn't the courage, not knowing what comes after. Were you very profound then?"
"Of course I wasn't!"
"Therefore it's nothing but a banality! Or, expressed in one word it is—what is it, Gustav?"
"Stale!" came a voice from the clock, a voice which seemed to have waited for its cue.
"It's stale! But, supposing the poet had given us an acceptable supposition of a future life, that would have been something new."
"Is everything new excellent?" asked Rehnhjelm. Under the pressure of all the new ideas to which he had been listening, his courage was fast ebbing away.
"New ideas have one great merit—they are new! Try to think your own thoughts and you will always find them new! Will you believe me when I say that I knew what you wanted before you walked in at that door? And that I know what you are going to say next, seeing that we are discussing Shakespeare?"
"You are a strange man! I can't help confessing that you're right in what you're saying, although I don't agree with you."
"What do you say to Anthony's speech over the body of Cæsar? Isn't it remarkable?"
"That's exactly what I was going to speak about. You seem to be able to read my thoughts."