Teodora. Reason may be on your side, Ernest, and in knowledge you are not deficient, but, believe me, in this case the heart alone speaks with wisdom.
D. Julian. Your father did not find me so ungenerous or so proud.
Teodora. Ah, friendship was then a very different thing.
Ernest. Teodora!
Teodora. [To Don Julian.] What a noble anxiety displays
Ernest. I know I seem ungrateful—I feel it—and an idiot to boot. Forgive me, Don Julian.
D. Julian. His head is a forge.
Teodora. [Also apart to Don Julian.] He doesn't live in this world.
D. Julian. Just so. He's full of depth and learning, and lets himself be drowned in a pool of water.
Ernest. [Meditatively.] True, I know little of life, and am not well fitted to make my way through it But I divine it, and shudder, I know not why. Shall I founder on the world's pool as upon the high sea? I may not deny that it terrifies me far more than the deep ocean. The sea only reaches the limit set by the loose sand: over all space travel the emanations of the pool. A strong man's arms can struggle with the waves of the sea, but no one can struggle against subtle miasma. But if I fall, I must not feel the humiliation of defeat. I wish and pray that at the last moment I may see the approach of the sea that will bear me away at its will; see the sword that is to pierce me, the rock against which I am to be crushed. I must measure my adversary's strength, and despise it falling, despise it dying, instead of tamely breathing the venom scattered through the ambient air.