However, he set himself to the task of consolation with equal philosophy and tenderness.

He began by reminding, or rather informing, Leonard Fairfield of all the instances of illustrious men afflicted by the injustice of others that occurred to his own excellent memory.

He told him how the great Epictetus, when in slavery, had a master whose favourite amusement was pinching his leg, which, as the amusement ended in breaking that limb, was worse than the stocks.

He also told him the anecdote of Lenny's own gallant countryman, Admiral Byng, whose execution gave rise to Voltaire's celebrated witticism, "En Angleterre on tue un admiral pour encourager les autres." ["In England they execute one admiral in order to encourage the others."] Many other illustrations, still more pertinent to the case in point, his erudition supplied from the stores of history.

But on seeing that Lenny did not seem in the slightest degree consoled by these memorable examples, he shifted his ground, and reducing his logic to the strict argumentum ad rem, began to prove, first, that there was no disgrace at all in Lenny's present position, that every equitable person would recognize the tyranny of Stirn and the innocence of its victim; secondly, that if even here he were mistaken, for public opinion was not always righteous, what was public opinion after all?
--"A breath, a puff," cried Dr.Riccabocca, "a thing without matter,--without length, breadth, or substance,--a shadow, a goblin of our own creating.