Tod was moved. The mention of his mother softened him at all times. Mr. Brandon sat down again.
“Don’t let us play at this pitched battle, Joe. Hear a bit of truth from me, of common sense: can’t you see that I have your interest at heart? There are two roads that lie before a young man on his setting out in life, either of which he can take: you can take either, even yet. The one leads to honour, to prosperity, to a clear conscience, to a useful career, to a hale and happy old age—and, let us hope, to heaven. The other leads to vice, to discomfort, to miserable self-torment, to a waste of talent and energies; in short, to altogether a lost life. Lost, at any rate, for this world: and—we’ll not speculate upon what it may be in the other. Are you attending?”
Tod just lifted his eyes in answer. I sat at the table by my books, silently turning some of their leaves, ready to drop through the floor with annoyance. Mr. Brandon resumed.
“You have come to the Oxford University to perfect your education; to acquire self-reliance, experience, and a tone of good manners; to keep upright ways, to eschew bad company, and to train yourself to be a Christian gentleman. Do this, and you will go home with satisfaction and a sound conscience. In time you will marry, and rear your children to good, and be respected of all men. This is the career expected of you; this is the road you ought to take.”
He paused slightly, and then went on.
“I will put the other road before you; the one you seem so eager to rush upon. Ah, boy! how many a one, with as hopeful a future before him as you have, has gone sliding, sliding down unconsciously, never meaning, poor fellow, to slide too far, and been lost in the vortex of sin and shame! You are starting on well for it. Wine, and cards, and betting, and debt; and a singing mermaid to lure you on! That woman, with the hard light eyes, and the seductive airs, has cast her spell upon you. You think her an angel, no doubt; I say she’s more of an angel’s opposite——”
“Mr. Brandon!”
“There are women in the world who will conjure a man’s coat off his back, and his pockets after it,” persisted Mr. Brandon, drowning the interruption. “She is one of them. They are bad to the core. They are; and they draw a man into all kinds of irretrievable entanglements. She will draw you: and the end may be that you’d find her saddled on you for good. Who will care to take your hand in friendship then? Will you dare to clasp that of honest people, or hold up your face in the light of day? No: not for very shame. That’s what gambling and evil courses will bring a man to: and, his self-respect once gone, it’s gone for ever. You will feel that you have raised a barrier between you and your kind: remembrance will be a sting, and your days will be spent in one long cry of too late repentance, ‘Oh, that I had been wise in time!’”
“You are altogether mistaken in her,” burst out Tod. “There’s no harm in her. She is as particular as—as any lady need be.”
“No harm in her!” retorted Mr. Brandon. “Is there any good in her? Put it at its best: she induces you to waste your time and your substance. How much money has the card-playing and the present-giving taken out of you, pray? What amount of debt has it involved you in? More than you know how to pay.”