I do not deny that a strong mind may emerge comparatively unscathed from the blighting environment of Little Muddleton Road; but a man or woman with inherited Respectability in his or her fibres, starts life's race handicapped, and it may need years before the poison can be eradicated from the moral system. In most cases the true congenital Respectable is a hopeless subject for experimentation. The task of reforming him needs far more patience and tact than most reformers possess; and even if the patient shows improvement, a transference into the infected areas is certain to result in a recrudescence of the disorder. Remember the true Congenital Respectable inherits a very vigorous and malignant taint; that his system is surcharged with humours that resist the most patient treatment. Are we, then, to despair of a cure? The answer must be, "No, not if all the available hygienic remedies are employed while the Respectable is young." I could not hope to heal the mind of a patient of forty, for instance, and especially a female patient of that age. In women there are characteristic symptoms of a nature so peculiar that we must differentiate them in our pathology from the specific manifestations of the affection in men. Obviously, the greatest impediment to recovery lies in the fact that, in nine instances out of ten, the subject has no desire to be cured. Respectability presents the phenomenon of most neurotic diseases: the patient does not understand that he is ill. If you tell a maniac that he is not the Emperor of Russia, but an inmate of Bedlam, he will think you are the madman, and that he is the sane man. In the same way, a person attacked by an insidious wasting malady imagines he is in robust health, because, when he has eaten a full meal he feels ready to eat another. He thumps himself on the chest, and says, "Sound as a bell! Look at my appetite!" Like these deluded folk, the Respectable believes firmly that his derangement is a normal healthy state. All his friends are Respectable; he is Respectable also, thank heaven!