"And then I felt that Amanda had cheated me! Outrageously.
Abominably.
"Now, so far as my intelligence goes, there is not a cloud upon this
question. My demand upon Amanda was outrageous and I had no right
whatever to her love or loyalty. I must have that very clear. . . .
"This aristocratic life, as I conceive it, must be, except
accidentally here and there, incompatible with the domestic life.
It means going hither and thither in the universe of thought as much
as in the universe of matter, it means adventure, it means movement
and adventure that must needs be hopelessly encumbered by an
inseparable associate, it means self-imposed responsibilities that
will not fit into the welfare of a family. In all ages, directly
society had risen above the level of a barbaric tribal village, this
need of a release from the family for certain necessary types of
people has been recognized. It was met sometimes informally,
sometimes formally, by the growth and establishment of special
classes and orders, of priests, monks, nuns, of pledged knights, of
a great variety of non-family people, whose concern was the larger
collective life that opens out beyond the simple necessities and
duties and loyalties of the steading and of the craftsman's house.
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