It is all right to deliberately choose a vocation which gives us contact
only with inanimate things, but we have no right to take the handling of
human souls unless we are specially fitted for the task.




To Clarence St. Claire

_Regarding His Sister's Betrothal_


Your request, my dear Clarence, that I try to influence your sister to
change her determination in this matter, calls for some very plain
statements from me.

I have known you and Elise since you were playing with marbles and
rattles, and your mother and I have been very good acquaintances
(scarcely intimate enough to be called friends) for more than a score of
years. You are very much like your mother, both in exterior appearance
and in mind. Elise is the image of her father at the time he captured
your mother's romantic fancy, and as I recollect him when he died.

You were five years old, Elise three, at that time. Your mother lived
with your father six years in months, an eternity in experience. You
know that she was unhappy, and that he disillusioned her with love, and
almost with life. He married your mother solely for her fortune. She was
a sweet and beautiful girl, of excellent family, but your father had no
qualities of mind or soul which enabled him to appreciate or care for
any woman, save as she could be of use to him, socially and financially.