"In one sense it is, Arthur. Do you know, I find myself somewhat changed. I perceive it when I settle myself down to my pursuits; and to a greater extent than I anticipated. It may be owing in part to the want of the facilities I had enjoyed for so many years, and never thought to part with more. I sometimes wonder whether I should be the same man again at home, among——But let all that pass. What I was thinking of, and what your mother and I oftenest think of, is the hardship of your having to bear a part,—so large a part in our misfortune. I should wonder to see you toiling as you do, from month to month,—(for I know that wealth is no great object with you,)—if I did not suspect——But I beg your pardon. I have no right to force your confidence."
“Go on, father.”
“Well, to say the truth, I suspect that you left something more behind you than you gave us reason to suppose. If you had not come of your own free choice, this idea would have made both your mother and me very unhappy.”
“I have hopes that she will come, father. I have been waiting to tell you, only for a prospect of the time when I might go for her. Nothing is settled, or I would have told you long ago; but I have hopes.”
Dr. Sneyd was so long silent, thinking how easily the use of some of Temple’s wasted money would have completed Arthur’s happiness ere this,—benefiting Temple and the whole community at the same time,—that his son feared he was disappointed. He had no apprehension of his being displeased at any part of his conduct.
“I hoped the prospect would have given you pleasure, father,” he said, in a tone of deep mortification.
"My dear son, so it does—the greatest satisfaction, I assure you; though, indeed, I do not know how you were to become aware of it without my telling you. I know my wife’s opinion of her to be the same as my own. I only hope she will be to you all that may repay you for what you have been to us: indeed, I have no doubt of it."
Arthur was perfectly happy; happy enough to observe that the clouds were parting, and that,—as science had been so lately pronounced the great end for which his father was living,—it was a pity his observations should not be renewed.
“If science be the great object we think it,” observed the doctor the next time he was obliged to suspend his labours, “it seems strange that it should be pursued by so few. At present, for one who devotes himself to the end, thousands look not beyond the mere means of living. I am not afraid to call it the end to you, though I would not have done so in my pulpit this morning without explanation. We understand one another.”
"Perfectly; that since the full recognition of truth is virtue, science is the true end. I hope, I believe, I discern the method by which more and more labour will be withdrawn from the means to be transferred to the end. For a long time past,—ever since I have been in the habit of comparing you and your pursuits with the people about you and their pursuits—ever since I came here,—I have been arriving at my present conviction, that every circumstance of our social condition,—the most trifling worldly interest of the meanest of us,—bears its relation to this great issue, and aids the force of tendency towards it."