The toothache cannot hurt us so long as the daemon within us (that is
to say, our will power) holds on to the chair and says it can't.
But, sooner or later, the daemon lets go, and then we howl. One sees
the idea: in theory it is excellent. One makes believe. Your bank
has suddenly stopped payment. You say to yourself.

"This does not really matter."

Your butcher and your baker say it does, and insist on making a row
in the passage.

You fill yourself up with gooseberry wine. You tell yourself it is
seasoned champagne. Your liver next morning says it is not.

The daemon within us means well, but forgets it is not the only thing
there. A man I knew was an enthusiast on vegetarianism. He argued
that if the poor would adopt a vegetarian diet the problem of
existence would be simpler for them, and maybe he was right. So one
day he assembled some twenty poor lads for the purpose of introducing
to them a vegetarian lunch. He begged them to believe that lentil
beans were steaks, that cauliflowers were chops. As a third course
he placed before them a mixture of carrots and savoury herbs, and
urged them to imagine they were eating saveloys.

"Now, you all like saveloys," he said, addressing them, "and the
palate is but the creature of the imagination. Say to yourselves, 'I
am eating saveloys,' and for all practical purposes these things will
be saveloys."