Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 7).djvu/234

 we human beings to happiness? We have simply to do our duty, Mrs. Alving! And your duty was to hold firmly to the man you had once chosen, and to whom you were bound by the holiest ties.

Mrs. Alving.

You know very well what sort of life Alving was leading—what excesses he was guilty of.

Manders.

I know very well what rumours there were about him; and I am the last to approve the life he led in his young days, if report did not wrong him. But a wife is not appointed to be her husband's judge. It was your duty to bear with humility the cross which a Higher Power had, in its wisdom, laid upon you. But instead of that you rebelliously throw away the cross, desert the back-*slider whom you should have supported, go and risk your good name and reputation, and—nearly succeed in ruining other people's reputation into the bargain.

Mrs. Alving.

Other people's? One other person's, you mean.

Manders.

It was incredibly reckless of you to seek refuge with me.

Mrs. Alving. With our clergyman? With our intimate friend?

Manders.

Just on that account. Yes, you may thank God that I possessed the necessary firmness; that I succeeded in dissuading you from your wild