“There is, or ought to be, in every man and woman some divine sense of purposefulness, some subtle foretaste of greater things that would make life worth living if everything else were taken away. And it ought to be completely independent of and separate from every other living creature in the world. Call it personality, or ‘ego,’ or anything you like. It is above jealousy and envy. It gives every man a sunken indestructible pride in being himself and no one else. That’s where novelists, sentimental folk and such like make their mistake. They give love far too prominent a place in the scheme of things.... Love is only one phase of life. At critical moments no doubt it does take precedence of everything else, but think of the heaps of other things that go to make up life! Ambition, for instance. And ideals.... A man may have ideals so utterly removed from all connection with love that if they were blurred by any act of his, love would be a worthless recompense.... Oh yes, falling in love may be a passably pleasant means of frittering away a dull seaside holiday, but for a busy ambitious spirit it spells--usually--ruination--unless--unless--” “Unless what?” “Unless,” he resumed, “the fates were so miraculously thoughtful as to provide such a man with somebody whose dreams and hopes and ambitions were in mystic harmony with his own.... And that, of course, is a miracle not to be expected once in a hundred years....” Pause. “And it is such a confoundedly casual business too,” he went on. “Falling in love, I mean. It’s about as sudden and spontaneous and unreasonable and unthought-out as walking down a railway platform beside a train of empty carriages and selecting one compartment in preference to all the others.... And think of the horror of falling in love, not merely with somebody you don’t like, but with somebody you actively dislike. Oh, I assure you, it’s quite possible. Some wretched creature with whom fate had capriciously made you infatuated! Someone who would monopolize selfishly everything in you that was free and open to all; someone who would divert everything high and noble in you to swell that tragic outflow of wasted ambitions, warped enthusiasms, cramped souls and stunted ideals! And someone, moreover, who would make it hard for you to value the people you liked but did not love! Think of it--all your life thrown out of perspective by something as casual and involuntary as a hundred unremembered things one does every day of one’s life!” They had entered the station-yard. It was beginning to rain in big, cold drops. “I suppose you think intellectual attachments are all right?” she remarked. He grunted.