"Granting your beliefs that no harm would come to your children, that it is all chance about these matters," persisted the father, "still you _cannot_ escape the family. You marry the conditions; they will remain with you. _They_, if nothing else, will ruin your life." The younger man rose as if to shake off a physical bandage. For the first time in his life he felt conscious of a rebellion with the elemental conditions of existence. "What if it does mean corruption and misery! I want my joy, my life, even if they write 'Failure' at the bottom of my page." "No, no!" his father protested. "You will take the pain all right and the consequences like a man, but you will never believe that swinish statement you have just made." This brought the younger man to his calmer mood. "I hate them," he said, bitterly, "more than you can; but her I love." "And to her you will sacrifice all?" His father looked at him searchingly, longingly. "Yes, if need be, _all_, but you!" The old man smiled coolly. "I shall not count long, and you are independent, anyway. But I don't care to put the matter on such a footing. We have not lived that way." "I will do whatever you desire," the son said, "except----" "I shall ask nothing," his father replied, gently. "If you mean to marry her you must do so now, when she will need you most. There can be no compromise, unless your own mind is divided." As Jarvis Thornton left the house that night he felt that he had dealt his father a blow. VII Some days later when Jarvis Thornton took the familiar turnpike road he had not recovered from the serious mood his father's talk had brought about. It hung on him like a weight. He did not ride at a lover's pace; rather, cool and determined, with a spice of pride in following his own judgment. But the old man's prophecy met an answering fear in his own mind--it was dangerous to pluck roses from some ruins. His father's sweetness in the matter got hold of him, and he began to appreciate, in a vague way, the yearning that old men have to witness fulfilment on the part of the younger generation. Mere age, he saw, reduces the complexity of desire, but renders it single and intense. Whether his father was right or not in his gloomy analysis, he was deeply convinced and foiled. His last method of success had turned out illusive, yet he had not reproached, nor domineered, nor dictated, nor appealed. He had expressed a little of his keen sorrow, but insidiously this attitude had tainted the young man's ecstasy.