For to say
something is what every puny whipster can do. To talk much, and in
many languages, and yet to have said nothing, that, my dear GILLIE, is
what all have striven for, but only one, gifted above his fellows
with magic power of weaving the gossamer thread of words, has truly
attained. For it is in that reconcilement of apparent opposites,
and in the cadenced measures of a musical voice, that the dignified
traditions of an aesthetic purity, repellent to the thin, colourless
lips of impotence, reside and make their home. But-- [Breaks off,
and lights a cigarette.
_G._ (_lighting a cigarette_). Is that really so?
_E._ Yea, even as LUCIAN-- [Short notes, to be afterwards filled
out:--Throw in Hector, the Myrmidons, COLERIDGE, RUSKIN, OHNET, LEWIS
MORRIS, ARISTOTLE, LIONARDO, St. Anne, Juno, Mr. HOWELLS, LONGINUS,
FRONTO, LESSING, Narcissus. Stir up with SHAKSPEARE and MILTON. Add
CICERO and BALZAC]
_G._ ERBERT, ERBERT, how learned you are, and how lovely! But I am
weary, and must away.
[He moves off. ERBERT attempts to detain him.
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