“Contentment,” I said, “in place of Happiness, is a horrid feeling. Not one of your countless advocates loves you. They all serve you faithfully and well, but with it all they hate you. Always people hate their tyrant. You are my tyrant, but I love you absorbingly, madly. Happiness for me would be to live with you and see you made happy by the overwhelming flood of my love.” “It interests me,” he said. “You are a most interesting feminine philosopher--and your philosophy is after my own heart, in its lack of _virtue_. It is to be hoped you are not ‘intellectual,’ which is an unpardonable trait.” “Indeed, I am not,” I replied. “Intellectual people are detestable. They have pale faces and bad stomachs and bad livers, and if they are women their corsets are sure to be too tight, and probably black, and if they are men they are _soft_, which is worse. And they never by any chance know what it means to walk all day in the rain, or to roll around on the ground in the dirt. And, above all, they never fall in love with the Devil.” “They are tiresome,” the Devil agreed. “If I were to marry you how long would you be happy?” “For three days.” “You are wise,” he said. “You are wonderfully wise in some things, though you are still very young.” “I am wise,” I answered. “Being of womankind and nineteen years, I am more than ready to give up absolutely everything that is good in the world’s sight, though they are contemptible things enough in my own, for love. All for love. Therefore I am wise. Also I am a fool.” “Why are you a fool?” “Because I am a genius.” “Your logic is good logic,” said the Devil. “My logic--oh, I don’t care anything about logic,” I said with sudden complete weariness. I felt buried and wrapped round and round in weariness. Everything lost its color. Everything turned cold. “At this moment,” said the Devil, “you feel as if you cared for nothing at all. But if I chose I could bring about a transfiguration. I could kiss your soul into Paradise.” I answered, “Yes,” without emotion. “An hour,” said the Devil, “is not very long. But we know it is long enough to suffer in, and go mad in, and live in, and be happy in. And the world contains a great many hours. Now I am leaving you. It is likely that I may never come again, and it is likely that I may come again.” It all vanished. I still sat by my window in the gloom. “It is dreary,” I said. But yes. The world contains a great many hours. April 4. I have asked for bread, sometimes, and I have been given a stone. Oh, it is a bitter thing--oh, it is piteous, piteous! I find that I am not far apart from human beings. I can still be crushed, wounded, stunned, by the attitude of human beings. To-day I looked for human-kindness, and I was given coldness. I repelled human beings. I asked for bread and I was given a stone. Oh, it is bitter--bitter. Oh, is there a thing in the wide world more bitter?