“I did not say so, I am sure.”
“Oh, you would tell him that you were not accustomed to him?”
“Not exactly in those words, perhaps.”
“Well, we shall not quarrel about words,” said Lady Delacour; “I only beg you to remember your own principles; and if ever you are put to the trial, be consistent. The first thing in a philosopher is to be consistent.”
“Fortunately, for the credit of my philosophy, there is no immediate danger of its being put to the test.”
“Unfortunately, you surely mean; unless you are afraid that it might not stand the test. But I was going, when I spoke of consistency, to remind you that all your own and Mr. Percival’s arguments about first loves may now, with equal propriety, be turned against you.”
“How against me?”
“They are evidently as applicable to second as to first loves, I think.”
“Perhaps they are,” said Belinda; “but I really and truly am not inclined to think of love at present; particularly as there is no necessity that I should.”
Belinda took up a book, and Lady Delacour for one half hour abstained from any farther raillery. But longer than half an hour she could not be silent on the subject uppermost in her thoughts.