DOCTOR. I was not asking you that. I was asking you if you had never exposed yourself to catching one. [_He pauses. Loches does not reply_] Ah, you see! Then it is not virtue that has saved you: it is luck. Few things exasperate me more than that term ‘shameful disease,’ which you used just now. This disease is like all other diseases: it is one of our afflictions. There is no shame in being wretched—even if one deserves to be so. [_Hotly_] Come, come: let us have a little plain speaking! I should like to know how many of these rigid moralists, who are so choked with their middle-class prudery that they dare not mention the name syphilis, or when they bring themselves to speak of it do so with expressions of every sort of disgust, and treat its victims as criminals, have never run the risk of contracting it themselves. It is those alone who have the right to talk. How many do you think there are? Four out of a thousand? Well, leave those four aside; between all the rest and those who catch the disease there is no difference but chance. [_Bursting out_] And by heavens, those who escape won’t get much sympathy from me: the others at least have paid their fine of suffering and remorse, while they have gone scot-free! [_Recovering himself_] Let’s have done, if you please, once for all with this sort of hypocrisy. Your son-in-law, like yourself and like the immense majority of men, has had mistresses before he married. He has had the ill-luck to catch syphilis, and married supposing that the disease was no longer dangerous when in fact it still was. It is a misfortune that we must do our best to remedy, and not to aggravate. Perhaps in your youth you deserved what he has got even more than he; at any rate your position towards him is as that of the culprit who has escaped punishment towards his less fortunate comrade. That is a reflection that should, I think, touch you. LOCHES. You put it in such a way— DOCTOR. Am I not right? LOCHES. Perhaps: but I can’t tell my daughter all this to persuade her to return to her husband. DOCTOR. There are other arguments that you can use. LOCHES. What, then, good heavens? DOCTOR. Any number. You can tell her that a separation will be a calamity for all parties and that her husband is the only person interested in helping her at any price to save her child. You can tell her that out of the ruins of her first happiness she can construct a life of solid affection that will have every chance of being lasting and most sincerely enviable. There is much truth in the saying that reformed rakes make the best husbands. Take your son-in-law. If your daughter consents to forgive and forget, he will not only respect her; he will be eternally grateful. You can tell her all this and you will find much else to say besides. As for the future, we will make sure that when they are re-united their next child shall be healthy and vigorous. LOCHES. Is that possible?