Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 7).djvu/258

 Manders.

Aha—here we have the fruits of your reading. And pretty fruits they are, upon my word! Oh, those horrible, revolutionary, freethinking books!

Mrs. Alving.

You are mistaken, my dear Pastor. It was you yourself who set me thinking; and I thank you for it with all my heart.

Manders. I!

Mrs. Alving.

Yes—when you forced me under the yoke of what you called duty and obligation; when you lauded as right and proper what my whole soul rebelled against as something loathsome. It was then that I began to look into the seams of your doctrines. I wanted only to pick at a single knot; but when I had got that undone, the whole thing ravelled out. And then I understood that it was all machine-sewn.

Manders.

[Softly, with emotion.] And was that the upshot of my life's hardest battle?

Mrs. Alving.

Call it rather your most pitiful defeat.

Manders.

It was my greatest victory, Helen—the victory over myself.

Mrs. Alving.

It was a crime against us both.