VIOLET. But why do you make me think of that verse then, about the foot and the eye?
L. You are indeed commanded to cut off and to pluck out, if foot or eye offend you; but why SHOULD they offend you?
VIOLET. I don't know; I never quite understood that.
L. Yet it is a sharp order; one needing to be well understood if it is to be well obeyed! When Helen sprained her ankle the other day, you saw how strongly it had to be bandaged; that is to say, prevented from all work, to recover it. But the bandage was not "lovely."
VIOLET. No, indeed.
L. And if her foot had been crushed, or diseased, or snake-bitten, instead of sprained, it might have been needful to cut it off. But the amputation would not have been "lovely."
VIOLET. No.
L. Well, if eye and foot are dead already, and betray you,—if the light that is in you be darkness, and your feet run into mischief, or are taken in the snare,—it is indeed time to pluck out, and cut off, I think: but, so crippled, you can never be what you might have been otherwise. You enter into life, at best, halt or maimed; and the sacrifice is not beautiful, though necessary.
VIOLET (after a pause). But when one sacrifices one's self for others?
L. Why not rather others for you?