Captivity by M. Leonora Eyles
page 61 of 514 (11%)
page 61 of 514 (11%)
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"God forbid! No, not like Aunt Janet. You'll see when you come to it, Marcella. But remember that the nearest most of us ever get to the perfect Trinity is a thing of shreds and patches. People don't manage to be perfect." "Christ?" ventured Marcella. "No. He was brain and spirit without a body." "Why, doctor, how about when He fasted in the wilderness--and the pain on the cross?" "Bodily pain is much easier to bear than bodily desire, Marcella. Your poor father would have found it easier to be crucified than to bear his longing for whisky. And Aunt Janet--ask her." "She wouldn't tell me." "No, I suppose she wouldn't. When she was young she saw a man she wanted. And he was a man she couldn't have. Until she got dead as she is now I expect she'd have thought crucifixion a thing easier to bear. No, there's no one perfect. All we are, any of us, is either a soul or a body or a brain developed at the expense of all the rest. We get great holes torn in us, just as if wolves had been clawing at us. And it's the body that makes the most dreadful tears. Most people don't see this. You see, the body's hungers are the most appeasable--and being the most appeasable one can't see why they shouldn't be yielded to." He stopped talking as they drove into the main street of Pitleathy, and |
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