My dear low,

I have made up my mind against taking the chambers, and am now off to the Inn to say that I shall not want them.  Of course, I know what you will think of me, and it is very grievous to me to have to bear the hard judgment of a man whose opinion I value so highly; but, in the teeth of your terribly strong arguments, I think that there is something to be said on my side of the question.  This seat in Parliament has come in my way by chance, and I think it would be pusillanimous in me to reject it, feeling, as I do, that a seat in Parliament confers very great honour.  I am, too, very fond of politics, and regard legislation as the finest profession going.  Had I any one dependent on me, I probably might not be justified in following the bent of my inclination.  But I am all alone in the world, and therefore have a right to make the attempt.  If, after a trial of one or two sessions, I should fail in that which I am attempting, it will not even then be too late to go back to the better way.  I can assure you that at any rate it is not my intention to be idle.

I know very well how you will fret and fume over what I say, and how utterly I shall fail in bringing you round to my way of thinking; but as I must write to tell you of my decision, I cannot refrain from defending myself to the best of my ability.

   Yours always faithfully,

   Phineas Finn.

Mr. Low received this letter at his chambers, and when he had read it, he simply pressed his lips closely together, placed the sheet of paper back in its envelope, and put it into a drawer at his left hand.  Having done this, he went on with what work he had before him, as though his friend’s decision were a matter of no consequence to him.  As far as he was concerned the thing was done, and there should be an end of it.  So he told himself; but nevertheless his mind was full of it all day; and, though he wrote not a word of answer to Phineas, he made a reply within his own mind to every one of the arguments used in the letter.  “Great honour!  How can there be honour in what comes, as he says, by chance?  He hasn’t sense enough to understand that the honour comes from the mode of winning it, and from the mode of wearing it; and that the very fact of his being member for Loughshane at this instant simply proves that Loughshane should have had no privilege to return a member!  No one dependent on him!  Are not his father and his mother and his sisters dependent on him as long as he must eat their bread till he can earn bread of his own?  He will never earn bread of his own.  He will always be eating bread that others have earned.”  In this way, before the day was over, Mr. Low became very angry, and swore to himself that he would have nothing more to say to Phineas Finn.  But yet he found himself creating plans for encountering and conquering the parliamentary fiend who was at present so cruelly potent with his