“Then? Why then—I was disillusioned!” she said. “That’s all!”
He paced two or three times up and down the room.
“Oh! That’s all!” he echoed. “And you think perhaps that I’m the only sort of man that proves a ‘disillusion’? You dear little goose! I’m sorry for you! You make ‘ideals’ which no man can ever come up to—and then you are vexed when they fail! If you’ve made an ideal of young Durham—”
“Oh, no, I haven’t ever made an ideal of him!” she said, emphatically. “He never professed to be clever—he’s just ordinary—nothing particular about him—but he wouldn’t hurt any one by saying unkind things—”
The Philosopher stopped abruptly in his pacing up and down.
“Dear child, the folks who allow themselves to be ‘hurt’ by what they consider an unkind thing, are silly and conceited folks at best. I don’t think you are silly or conceited—but if you feel ‘hurt’ at anything I have said to you or at anything anybody has said, then you haven’t as big a spirit as I thought you had! I may be rough—I may be rude—but you, in your youth and strength should make allowances for age in a man,—for disappointments and difficulties and disillusions far worse than your disillusionment—disillusions extending over a long life of study and thought—study of human nature, which teaches you not to expect the best but always the worst—”
“That’s where you are wrong!” she exclaimed. “You should expect the best!—the best always!”
He came up to her and taking her hand, patted it soothingly.
“Charming!—charming!” he said. “You are a true sentimentalist; but a very sweet little lady all the same! And now what you have to do is to put your precept into practice!—expect the best!—the best always!—even the best of Me!”