Page:Whyte-Melville--Bones and I.djvu/255

 substances whereof they are but the fading phantoms, as the dog in the fable dropped a piece of meat out of his jaws to snatch a like morsel from the other dog he saw reflected in the water. Every day men grasp at clouds as did Ixion, bartering eagerly for that which they know to be illusive the solid joys and advantages of life. How many people in the possession of sufficient incomes deprive themselves of common comfort in an attempt to appear richer and more liberal than they really are! How many forego the society of friends in which they find honest pleasure for that of mere acquaintances with whom they have scarce a thought in common, because the latter, perhaps themselves sacrificed to the same illusion, move in a higher and more ostentatious class of society! With one the shadow is a reputation for wealth, with another for taste. Here it is a, house in Belgravia, there a villa