No, I shouldn't have told you.

But you've got such a kind look about you--as if you'd understand." She was touched in spite of herself.

She got up quickly and faced him.
"What I can't understand," she said, a ring of deep feeling in her voice, "is how anyone can possibly barter their happiness, their self-respect, all that is most worth having, for this world's goods, this world's ambitions, and expect to come out of it anything but losers.

Oh, I know it's done every day.

People fight and scramble--yes, and grovel in the mud--for what they think is gold; and when they've got it, it's only the basest alloy.