s mother then
began, as if there had been no interval since the morning. "It disturbs
me, Clym, to find that you have come home with such thoughts as those. I
hadn't the least idea that you meant to go backward in the world by your
own free choice. Of course, I have always supposed you were going to
push straight on, as other men do--all who deserve the name--when they
have been put in a good way of doing well."

"I cannot help it," said Clym, in a troubled tone. "Mother, I hate
the flashy business. Talk about men who deserve the name, can any man
deserving the name waste his time in that effeminate way, when he sees
half the world going to ruin for want of somebody to buckle to and teach
them how to breast the misery they are born to? I get up every morning
and see the whole creation groaning and travailing in pain, as St. Paul
says, and yet there am I, trafficking in glittering splendours with
wealthy women and titled libertines, and pandering to the meanest
vanities--I, who have health and strength enough for anything. I have
been troubled in my mind about it all the year, and the end is that I
cannot do it any more."

"Why can't you do it as well as others?"

"I don't know, except that there are many things other people care for
which I don't; and that's partly why I think I ought to do this. For one
thing, my body does not require much of me. I cannot enjoy delicacies;
good things are wasted upon me. Well, I ought to turn that defect to
advantage, and by being able to do without what other people require I
can spend what such things cost upon anybody else."

Now, Yeobright, having inherited some of these very instincts from the
woman before him, could not fail to awaken a reciprocity in her through
her feelings, if not by arguments, disguise it as she might for his
good. She spoke with less assurance. "And yet you might have been a
wealthy man if you had only persevered. Manager to that large diamond
establishment--what better can a man wish for? What a post of trust
and respect! I suppose you will be like your father; like him, you are
getting weary of doing well."

"No," said her son, "I am not weary of that, though I am weary of what
you mean by it. Mother, what is doing well?"

Mrs. Yeobright was far too thoughtful a woman to be content with ready
definitions, and, like the "What is wisdom?" of Plato's Socrates, and
the "What is truth?" of Pontius Pilate, Yeobright's burning question
received no answer.