We are maligned; but our soul acquits us.

Could it do more in the scandal and the prejudice that assail us in private life?
You are silent; but note how much deeper should be the comfort, how much loftier the self-esteem; for if calumny attack us in a wilful obscurity, what have we done to refute the calumny?
How have we served our species?
Have we 'scorned delight and loved laborious days'?
Have we made the utmost of the 'talent' confided to our care?
Have we done those good deeds to our race upon which we can retire,--an 'Estate of Beneficence,'-- from the malice of the world, and feel that our deeds are our defenders?
This is the consolation of virtuous actions; is it so of--even a virtuous--indolence ?" "You speak as a preacher," said Vane,--"I merely as a calculator; you of virtue in affliction, I of a life in ease." "Well, then, if the consciousness of perpetual endeavour to advance our race be not alone happier than the life of ease, let us see what this vaunted ease really is.

Tell me, is it not another name for _ennui_?
This state of quiescence, this objectless, dreamless torpor, this transition _du lit a la table, de la table au lit_,--what more dreary and monotonous existence can you devise?
Is it pleasure in this inglorious existence to think that you are serving pleasure?
Is it freedom to be the slave to self?
For I hold," continued Trevylyan, "that this jargon of 'consulting happiness,' this cant of living for ourselves, is but a mean as well as a false philosophy.

Why this eternal reference to self?
Is self alone to be consulted?
Is even our happiness, did it truly consist in repose, really the great end of life?
I doubt if we cannot ascend higher.

I doubt if we cannot say with a great moralist, 'If virtue be not estimable in itself, we can see nothing estimable in following it for the sake of a bargain.' But, in fact, repose is the poorest of all delusions; the very act of recurring to self brings about us all those ills of self from which, in the turmoil of the world, we can escape.