“Well, Philip, do you know that I think the best thing that could happen to you would be to have the story rejected.”

“It has been rejected several times,” said Philip.  “That didn’t seem to do me any good.”

“But finally, so that you would stop thinking about it, stop expecting anything that way, and take up your profession in earnest.”

“You are a nice comforter!” retorted Philip, with a sort of smirking grin and a look of keen inspection, as if he saw something new in the character of his adviser.  “What has come over you?  Suppose I should give you that sort of sympathy in the projects you set your heart on?”

“It does seem hard and mean, doesn’t it?  I knew you wouldn’t like it.  That is, not now.  But it is for your lifetime.  As for me, I’ve wanted so many things and I’ve tried so many things.  And do you know, Phil, that I have about come to the conclusion that the best things for us in this world are the things we don’t get.”

“You are always coming to some new conclusion.”

“Yes, I know.  But just look at it rationally.  Suppose your story is published, cast into the sea of new books, and has a very fair sale.  What will you get out of it?  You can reckon how many copies at ten cents a copy it will need to make as much as some writers get for a trivial magazine paper.  Recognition?  Yes, from a very few people.  Notoriety?  You would soon find what that is.  Suppose you make what is called a ‘hit.’  If you did not better that with the next book, you would be called a failure.  And you must keep at it, keep giving the public something new all the time, or you will drop out of sight.  And then the anxiety and the strain of it, and the temptation, because you must live, to lower your ideal, and go down to what you conceive to be the buying public.  And if your story does not take the popular fancy, where will you be then?”

“Celia, you have become a perfect materialist.  You don’t allow anything for the joy of creation, for the impulse of a man’s mind, for the delight in fighting for a place in the world of letters.”

“So it seems to you now.  If you have anything that must be said, of course you ought to say it, no matter what comes after.  If you are looking round for something you can say in order to get the position you covet, that is another thing.  People so deceive themselves about this.  I know literary workers who lead a dog’s life and are slaves to their pursuit, simply because they have deceived themselves in this.  I want you to be free and independent, to live your own life and do what work you can in the world.  There, I’ve said it, and of course you will go right on.  I know you.  And maybe I am all wrong.  When I see the story I may take the other side and urge you to go on, even if you are as poor as a church-mouse, and have to be under the harrow of poverty for years.”

“Then you have some curiosity to see the story?”