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THE MAKROPOULOS SECRET

Don’t worry about her. Prus, if you, yourself, had the secret in your hands, would you give it to me? You know so I could live for three hundred years?

No.

You see, gentlemen, we shall have to come to some agreement among ourselves. What shall we do with it?

We’ll make the Makropoulos secret public.

Oh, no! Not that!

We’ll give it to everybody! We’ll give it to the people. Everyone—everyone has the same right to life. We live for such a short time. How insignificant! God! How insignificant it is to be a human being.

Rubbish!

No, gentlemen, it does mean something! Just consider—the human soul, brains, work, love—everything. Good God, what can a man do in sixty years! What does he enjoy? What