me, Oswald! I must make it less... you must help me. It must be one of the good works of your friendship, of your love, for me. Oh, Oswald, Oswald!... you are not only to console me for all that I have suffered, for anything in my past that has gone wrong. For, you are to help me to make myself over, indeed, in all that is possible, whatever cannot be so."
"We must help each other Imre. But do not speak so of woman, my brother! Sexually, we may not value her. We may not need her, as do those Others. But think of the joy that they find in her to which we are cold; the ideals from which we are shut out! Think of your mother, Imre; as I think of mine! Think of the queens and peasants who have been the light and the glory of races and peoples. Think of the gentle, noble sisters and wives, the serene, patient rulers of myriad homes. Think of the watching nurses in the hospitals... of the spirits of mercy who walk the streets of plague and foulness!... think of the nun on her knees for the world...!"
