"You too have proverbs, and one of them is that a man is better sitting than standing; better lying than sitting; better dead than lying down.

Now I should apply that same proverb to marriage.

A man is, by a similar successive reasoning, better with no wife at all than with three." His subtle mind caught the flaw instantly.

"To be without a wife at all would be about as conducive to happiness as to be dead.

Negative happiness, very negative." "Negative happiness is better than positive discomfort." "Come, come," he answered, "we are bandying terms and words, as if empty breath amounted to anything but inanity.