"
His excitement increased as he went on. He was arguing against the
coward sense that he had deserved the troubles which had come upon him.
He was saying in as plain language as the conditions of the
conversation would allow, that he had been right in gratifying his
desires; in living as he wished without too closely considering the
consequences which were likely to follow. He spoke with a bitter
earnestness born of the intense strain under which he was laboring; and
he did not consider how his words might or might not affect his hearer.
The thought came into his mind how he had deliberately sacrificed his
convictions in marrying Edith Caldwell and going over to Philistinism;
and he reflected that this decision had shaped his life. Already his
course was determined; it was idle to ignore the fact.
Why should he hesitate from squeamish scruples to do what Irons asked
when to meet the consequences of the latter's anger would not only be
supremely disagreeable but contrary to his whole theory of life?
It was one of Fenton's peculiarities that he never knowingly shrank
from telling himself the truth about his thoughts and actions with the
most brutal frankness. Indeed, it might not be too much to say that
this self-honesty was a sort of fetish to which he made expiatory
sacrifices in the shape of the most cruelly disagreeable admissions
before his inner consciousness.
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