I am sure that career has caused you more privations than joys, more pains than pleasures.

Ever since I have known you I have been convinced that your happiness lay in your study and in society, and that any path which led you elsewhere was a departure from happiness." Through nine pages of gentle and friendly eloquence Deyverdun pursues his argument to induce his friend to clinch the bargain.

"I advise you not only not to solicit a place, but to refuse one if it were offered to you.

Would a thousand a year make up to you for the loss of five days a week ?...

By making this retreat to Switzerland, besides the beauty of the country and the pleasures of its society, you will acquire two blessings which you have lost, liberty and competence.