After all, you know, you must be held in a measure responsible for my depravity.' 'How's that ?' 'I understand that you have devoted most of your life to the making of paper.

If that article were not so cheap and so abundant, people wouldn't have so much temptation to scribble.' Alfred Yule uttered a short laugh.
'I think you are cornered, John.' 'I wish,' answered John, 'that you were both condemned to write on such paper as I chiefly made; it was a special kind of whitey-brown, used by shopkeepers.' He chuckled inwardly, and at the same time reached out for a box of cigarettes on a table near him.

His brother and Jasper each took one as he offered them, and began to smoke.
'You would like to see literary production come entirely to an end ?' said Milvain.
'I should like to see the business of literature abolished.' 'There's a distinction, of course.

But, on the whole, I should say that even the business serves a good purpose.' 'What purpose ?' 'It helps to spread civilisation.' 'Civilisation!' exclaimed John, scornfully.

'What do you mean by civilisation?
Do you call it civilising men to make them weak, flabby creatures, with ruined eyes and dyspeptic stomachs?
Who is it that reads most of the stuff that's poured out daily by the ton from the printing-press?
Just the men and women who ought to spend their leisure hours in open-air exercise; the people who earn their bread by sedentary pursuits, and who need to live as soon as they are free from the desk or the counter, not to moon over small print.