“Look at yourself. You are seeing you that are, while I am you that used to be. I reckon you know me now.”
I stared again at my misbegotten self in the mirror, the self that is, and I thought upon what had just been uttered by the self that was. A weird truth came to me, and I spoke this thought aloud:
“You have spoken correctly, for if the boy is father to the man, he may beget a legitimate self or an illegitimate self. You, damn you, you did not create the self that might have been, but begot me, a bastard self.”
“Well,” he said defiantly, “I admit it. What then?”
“Why did you do so—why did you ruin your future—why did you wish me to be a failure?”
“Why was I weak?—that is what you mean. Well, my son, I can not tell you. It was in me and it had to come out. Perhaps my ancestors were to blame; perhaps I alone was to blame. They say we are masters of our fate. I doubt it. Surely no more sensitive, passionate youth longed as actually as I did to make you noble and true and generous. Was there ever a grander wreck? Look at yourself. Gaze into the diorama of your mind, and what do you see?”
I looked and saw the dismal pomp unroll before my mental eyes. And I saw a mass of indecision.
“Behold! there come the Ghosts of Past Intentions. I was going to marry the love of my life—that is the saddest ghost of all. I intended to be industrious and win fame for her—and see what I have done—nothing—and my life is sailing away, growing dimmer and dimmer, until now my worthy craft is a weather-beaten derelict even before my prime. This ghost gets up with me in the morning, sits with me at meals, reads every book I hold in my hand, goes on all my walks, sips each glass of my sangaree, retires to bed with me at night. This ghost is Insomnia Incarnate.
“Here comes another procession—the Imps of Lost Opportunities. Why was I not able to grasp them? The next company of players tell the tale. They are the ever-present giants, tyrants—Weak Resolutions—weak, weak, weak—back to the word you spoke!”