my mind about them. Sometimes I think it's all right to make them
and buy them; sometimes I think it's all wrong.'

'Oh, if that's your difficulty,' said Berkeley, pulling his white
tie straight at the tiny round looking-glass, 'I can easily reassure
you. Do you think a hundred and eighty pounds a year an excessive
sum for one person to spend upon his own entire living?'

'It doesn't seem so, as expenses go amongst US,' said Ernest, seriously,
'though I dare say it would look like shocking extravagance to a
working man with a wife and family.'

'Very well, that's the very outside I ever spend upon myself in
any one year, for the excellent reason that it's all I ever get to
spend in any way. Now, why shouldn't I spend it on the things that
please me best and are joys for ever, instead of on the things that
disappear at once and perish in the using?'

'Ah, but that's not the whole question,' Ernest answered, looking
at the curate fixedly. 'What right have you and I to spend so much
when others are wanting for bread? And what right have you or I
to make other people work at producing these useless trinkets for
our sole selfish gratification?'

'Well now, Le Breton,' said the parson, assuming a more serious tone,
'you know you're a reasonable creature, so I don't mind discussing
this question with you. You've got an ethical foundation to
your nature, and you want to see things done on decent grounds of
distributive justice. There I am one with you. But you've also got
an aesthetic side to your nature, which makes you worth arguing