"Just think: to hold as worthless the prejudices of public opinion and the art of reconciling duty and pleasure. So the world detests every emotion that is sincere. What can they think of Mme. Passerat who finds a means of having two husbands--one for his money, and the other to be in the style." "For heaven's sake, be quiet. I dine with her every Saturday and her cuisine is the very best in Grenoble." "Or that stout Mme. Bonnard-Basson, who from sheer snobbishness is on the lookout for a titled lover." "That is the way commerce renders homage to aristocracy." "Or that crabbed Mme. de Vimelle who knows it, and makes use of her knowledge to further the good of her family." "She is a good manager." "That is, without taking into account all that we don't know." With an indulgent, disillusioned air, the old man soothed his companion. "You are irritable. The hardest thing in life is to accept one's fate. Everyone envies the lot of everyone else, and seeks to ameliorate his own by complicating it. This is a great source of error. What we need is a little philosophy and a few concessions; to offset our curiosity and greed by the cultivation of some of those harmless tastes which broaden our horizon without harming other people; that is to say: art, reading, travel, good food, conversation, even dissipation, or rather a little prodigality, a daily task, children to bring up! That will satisfy the most unreasonable or the most ambitious. As to passion, it is certainly detestable. It moves about in our civilized land like a blind man in a drawing-room full of knick-knacks, and it should be put out of the house. Added to that, it does not bring happiness even to the simpletons who hope to get it that way." "It is not happiness they seek in passion." "What then?" "Intensity of living." M. Prémereux looked at him as at a curiosity from a museum. "You are young--" "They told me that only to-day." "Your eyes are not yet open." "Mine?" said Philippe, surprised and piqued; he prided himself on never being deceived. "Yes, yours. In order to judge, one must not be concerned in the trial, and you are constantly summoning yourself to appear when you make your own estimates. But never mind, the greater part of mankind open their eyes only once." "Only once?" "Yes--at death--and then they are quickly shut." III THE PLAINTIFF