"Although, in some respects, I deserve all I've got—I'm bad and mean right through."
"Indeed!" said Mavis, as before.
"But there's something to be said for me. To begin with, no one can help being what they are. There's no more merit in your being good than there is demerit in my being what I am."
"Did I ever lay claim to goodness?"
"Because you didn't, it goes nearer to making you good and admirable than anything else you could do. Directly virtue becomes self-conscious, it is vulgar."
Mavis began to wonder if it would ease the pain at her heart if she were to confess her duplicity to her husband.
Perigal continued:
"An act is judged by its results; it is considered either virtuous or vicious according as its results are harmful or helpful to the person affected."
"Indeed!" said Mavis absently.
"Once upon a time, there was no right and no wrong, till one man in the human tribe got more than his fair share of arrow-heads—then, his wish to keep them without fighting for them led to the begetting of vice and virtue as we know it."