“He is the only man I have ever stooped to envy.”
“You have reason to,” said Marian, suddenly grave.
“I envy him sometimes myself. What would you give to be never without a purpose, never with a regret, to regard life as a succession of objects each to be accomplished by so many days’ work; to take your pleasure in trifling lazily with the consciousness of possessing a strong brain; to study love, family affection, and friendship as a doctor studies breathing or digestion; to look on disinterestedness as either weakness or hypocrisy, and on death as a mere transfer of your social function to some member of the next generation?”
“I could achieve all that, if I would, at the cost of my soul. I would not for worlds be such a man, save on one condition.”
“To wit?”
“That only as such could I win the woman I loved.”
“Oh, you would not think so much of an insignificant factor like love if you were Ned.”
“May I ask, do you, too, think of love as ‘an insignificant factor’?”
“I? Oh, I am not a sociologist. Besides, I have never been in love.”
“What! You have never been in love?”