"But what do you understand by the term 'good'? In my opinion,
unless virtue be to their advantage, folk spit upon that
'goodness,' that 'honourableness,' of yours. Hence, the better
plan is to pay folk court, and be civil to them, and flatter and
cajole every mother's son of them. Yes, do that, and your
'goodness' will have a chance of bringing you in some return. Not
that I do not say that to be 'good,' to be able to look your
own ugly jowl in the face in a mirror, is pleasant enough; but,
as I see the matter, it is all one to other people whether you
be a cardsharper or a priest so long as you're polite, and let
down your neighbours lightly. That's what they want."

For my part I never, at that period, grew weary of watching my
fellows, for it was my constant idea that some day one of them
would be able to raise me to a higher level, and to bring me to
an understanding of this unintelligible and complicated
existence of ours. Hence I kept asking myself the restless, the
importunate question:

"What precisely is the human soul?

Certain souls, I thought, existed which seemed like balls of
copper, for, solid and immovable, they reflected things from
their own point of view alone, in a dull and irregular and
distorted fashion. And souls, I thought, existed which seemed as
flat as mirrors, and, for all intents and purposes, had no
existence at all.

And in every case the human soul seemed formless, like a cloud,
and as murkily mutable as an imitation opal, a thing which