medieval limbs, but--But what nonsense! When real things are so
wonderful, what is the point of pretending?

And so Rickie deflected his enthusiasms. Hitherto they had played
on gods and heroes, on the infinite and the impossible, on virtue
and beauty and strength. Now, with a steadier radiance, they
transfigured a man who was dead and a woman who was still alive.



VII

Love, say orderly people, can be fallen into by two methods: (1)
through the desires, (2) through the imagination. And if the
orderly people are English, they add that (1) is the inferior
method, and characteristic of the South. It is inferior. Yet
those who pursue it at all events know what they want; they are
not puzzling to themselves or ludicrous to others; they do not
take the wings of the morning and fly into the uttermost parts of
the sea before walking to the registry office; they cannot breed
a tragedy quite like Rickie's.

He is, of course, absurdly young--not twenty-one and he will be
engaged to be married at twenty-three. He has no knowledge of the
world; for example, he thinks that if you do not want money you
can give it to friends who do. He believes in humanity because he
knows a dozen decent people. He believes in women because he has
loved his mother. And his friends are as young and as ignorant as
himself. They are full of the wine of life. But they have not
tasted the cup--let us call it the teacup--of experience, which