The case (if I may speak as a spiritual physician) was now quite plain to me.

It is no uncommon event, in the experience of us all, to see the possessors of exalted ability occasionally humbled to the level of the most poorly-gifted people about them.

The object, no doubt, in the wise economy of Providence, is to remind greatness that it is mortal and that the power which has conferred it can also take it away.

It was now--to my mind--easy to discern one of these salutary humiliations in the deplorable proceedings on dear Mr.Godfrey's part, of which I had been the unseen witness.

And it was equally easy to recognise the welcome reappearance of his own finer nature in the horror with which he recoiled from the idea of a marriage with Rachel, and in the charming eagerness which he showed to return to his Ladies and his Poor.
I put this view before him in a few simple and sisterly words.