He found the old man in a serious mood, but without the agitation he had feared. "Come and shake hands with me," cried Balthasar as he entered, "although you choose to leave me. How I shall support your absence I cannot yet conceive, anymore than I should know how I could live without light and warmth: but nevertheless I shall be forced to learn this lesson, if nothing can alter or upset your determination." "My fatherly friend," Edward began, "can you then persist in your determination, which to me is so utterly incomprehensible? Is it quite impossible for you to consent to what alone will make me happy, and assuredly will make your daughter so too?" "I had hoped, my dear friend," answered the old man very mildly, "you would not have toucht on this string again, which thrills far too painfully through my whole frame. Pray convince yourself that this long-formed resolution, which you if you please may term a whim, I cannot possibly revoke; it is much too firmly intertwined with my whole being. What we do from conviction as we call it, from pondering about a matter and balancing it first in one scale and then in the other, over and over again, is seldom worth much. Whatever is permanent, characteristic, genuine in our nature, is instinct, prejudice, call it superstition;--a conclusion without question or inquiry, an act because one cannot help it. Such is this of mine! You may look upon it as a vow, a solemn oath which I have sworn to myself, and which I cannot violate without the most atrocious perjury against my own heart. I owe my poor good Eleazar much amends for having let my soul entertain and cherish disgust, bitterness, and aversion toward him for so many years.--And as to the happiness of the pair!--on this point my opinion is just the reverse of yours. He is wise, sensible, virtuous; he is happy already, and will keep so, whether he marry or not. It is an act of condescension in a person of his grave character to take up with my daughter. A man who has got the philosopher's stone can never be harmed by any of earth's paltry troubles. And my Rose! O my dear friend, the truly dreadful thing would be, if I were to give her to you to wife: this being, this child, that I cannot help loving so dearly, that I fold up with remorse and sorrow in my heart, would go to wreck like others amid the pleasures of the world, in self-will and frivolity, in dissipation and recklessness. You would indulge her out of love in all sorts of follies, and so make her and yourself miserable. No, it cannot be on any terms; and you yourself will thank me hereafter for my reasonable refusal. And now not a word more, dearest Edward, on this subject: let us come to your other request, which I can safely promise to grant you."