"Brooks is a mixture of the sentimentalist and the
hideous pessimist, you know, and it is the privilege of his years to be
sometimes in earnest. I know nothing more depressing than to listen to
a man who is in earnest."
"You are getting positively light-headed," Sybil laughed. "I can see no
pleasure in life save that which comes from an earnest pursuit of
things, good or evil."
"My dear child," Lord Arranmore answered, "when you are a little older
you will know that to take life seriously is a sheer impossibility. You
may think that you are doing it, but you are not."
"There must be exceptions," Sybil declared.
"There are none," Lord Arranmore answered, lightly, "outside the
madhouse. For the realization of life comes only hand in hand with
insanity. The people who have come nearest to it carry the mark with
them all their life. For the fever of knowledge will scorch even those
who peer over the sides of the cauldron."
Lady Caroom helped herself to some more tea.
"Really, Arranmore," she drawled, "for sheer and unadulterated pessimism
you are unsurpassed.
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