Page:Five Russian plays and one Ukrainian.pdf/92

70 : Agree that it’s more beautiful than yours.


 * But the reason for it


 * You madden me. What reason? Can you still keep on hugging that “reason”? What! hasn’t the senselessness of existence stared you in the face yet? You haven’t yet shrunk with horror at its look? Wait, wait! I had too high an opinion of you. The hour will come when it’ll happen. The hour will come when the demon of vengeance will awake in you, the terrible demon of vengeance, and when you will want to seize the globe like a stone from the street of the world and throw it with all your force at the great Policeman. (Enter Maid.)


 * Lord, what a passion!


 * A pipe. (Exit Maid.)


 * And you’ve become a phrase-maker, dear old chap. I hope you’re not offended at my frankness, because


 * Come, can we be anything else? It’s time at last to recognise that even the cleverest of us, the most talented, the most learned, is no more than a posing phrase-maker. Aren't we all bewitched in a circle of error; aren’t all our reasonings the chatter of children?