Master of His Fate | Page 5

cup of tea in the meantime. Come
and sit down, and tell me where you have been."

But when they had sat down, Julius was little inclined to divagate into
an account of his travels. His glance swept round and noted everything;
he remarked on a soft effect of a shaft of sunshine that lit up the small
conservatory, and burnished the green of a certain plant; he perceived a
fine black Persian cat, the latest pet of the Club, and exclaimed, "What
a beautiful, superb creature!" He called it, and it came, daintily sniffed
at his leg, and leaped on his lap, where he stroked and fondled it. And
all the while he continued to discuss illusion, while Lefevre poured and
drank tea (tea, which Julius would not share: tea, he said, did not agree
with him).
"It bothers me," he said, "to imagine how a man like Embro gets any
satisfaction out of life, for ever mumbling the bare dry bones of science.
Such a life as his might as well be passed in the receiver of an
air-pump."
"Still the old Julius!" said the doctor, with a smile. "Still dreaming and
wandering, interested in everything, but having nothing to do!"
"Nothing to do, my dear fellow?" said Julius. "I've all the world to
enjoy!" and he buried his cheek in the soft fur of the cat.
"A purpose in life, however," said Lefevre, "gives an extraordinary zest
to all enjoyment."
"To live," said Julius, "is surely the purpose of life. Any smaller, any
more obvious purpose, will spoil life, just as it spoils Art."
"I believe, my boy, you are wrong in both," said Lefevre. "Art without
a purpose goes off into all sorts of madness and extravagance, and so
does life."
"You really think so?" said Julius, his attention fixed for an instant, and
looking as if he had set up the point and regarded it at a distance. "Yes;
perhaps it does." But the next moment his attention seemed given to the
cat; he fondled it, and talked to it soothingly.
"I am sure of it," said Lefevre. "Just listen to me, Julius. You have

wonderful intelligence and penetration in everything. You are fond of
science; science needs men like you more than the dull plodders that
usually take to it. When you were in Charbon's class you were his
favourite and his best pupil,--don't I remember?--and if you liked you
could be the greatest physician of the age."
"It is treason to yourself to say such a thing."
"Your fame would soon eclipse mine."
"Fame! fame!" exclaimed Julius, for an instant showing irritation. "I
would not give a penny-piece for fame if all the magicians of the East
came crying it down the streets! Why should I seek fame? What good
would it do me if I had it?"
"Well, well," said Lefevre; "let fame alone: you might be as unknown
as you like, and do a world of good in practice among the poor."
Julius looked at him, and set the cat down.
"My dear Lefevre," said he, "I did not think you could urge such
common twaddle! You know well enough,--nobody knows better,--first
of all, that there are already more men waiting to do that kind of thing
than can find occupation: why should I go down among them and try to
take their work? And you know, in the next place, that medical
philanthropy, like all other philanthropy, is so overdone that the race is
fast deteriorating; we strive with so much success to keep the sickly
and the diseased alive, that perfect health is scarcely known. Life
without health can be nothing but a weariness: why should it be
reckoned a praiseworthy thing to keep it going at any price? If life
became a burden to me, I should lay it down."
"But," said Lefevre, earnestly, "your life surely is not your own to do
with it what you like!"
"In the name of truth, Lefevre," answered Julius, "if my life is not my
own, what is? I get its elements from others, but I fashion it myself, just
as much as the sculptor shapes his statue, or the poet turns his poem.

You don't deny to the sculptor the right to smash his statue if it does not
please him, nor to the poet the right to burn his manuscript;--why
should you deny me the right to dispose of my life? I know--I know,"
said he, seeing Lefevre open his mouth and raise his hand for another
observation, "that your opinion is the common one, but that is the only
sanction it has; it has the sanction neither of true morality nor of true
religion! But here is the waiter to tell you the carriage is come. I'm glad.
Let us get