He
has developed faster even than you prophesied, and for good and evil
alike he takes up a formidable space. There 's too much of him for me,
at any rate. Yes, he is hard; there is no mistake about that. He 's
inflexible, he 's brittle; and though he has plenty of spirit, plenty of
soul, he has n't what I call a heart. He has something that Miss Garland
took for one, and I 'm pretty sure she 's a judge. But she judged on
scanty evidence. He has something that Christina Light, here, makes
believe at times that she takes for one, but she is no judge at all! I
think it is established that, in the long run, egotism makes a failure
in conduct: is it also true that it makes a failure in the arts?...
Roderick's standard is immensely high; I must do him that justice. He
will do nothing beneath it, and while he is waiting for inspiration, his
imagination, his nerves, his senses must have something to amuse them.
This is a highly philosophical way of saying that he has taken to
dissipation, and that he has just been spending a month at Naples--a
city where 'pleasure' is actively cultivated--in very bad company.
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