"Oh, all sorts of things," answered Leonora. "He does not believe at all in the greatest good of the greatest number. He says he has discovered the Spencerian fallacy, as he calls it."
"Absolutely nothing, dear," continued Leonora. "He says that, if there is no morality beyond happiness"--
--"then every individual has as much right to be happy as the whole human race put together, since he is under no moral obligation to anybody or anything, there being no abstract morality. Do you see? It is very pretty. And then he says it follows that there is no absolute good unless from a divine standard, which of course is pure nonsense, or ought to be, if Hegel is right."
"And so, dears," concluded Leonora triumphantly, "we are all going to the Devil do you see?" The association of ideas seemed exhilarating to Miss Carnethy, and in truth the conclusion was probably suggested more by her feelings than by her logic, if she really possessed any. She felt better, and would put off the further consideration of Nothing and Being to some more convenient season. She therefore gave her friends some tea in her bedroom, and the conversation became more and more earthly, and the subjects more and more minute, until they seemed to be thoroughly within the grasp of the three young ladies.
At last they went, these two charming damsels, very much impressed with Leonora's cleverness, and very much interested in her future,--which she would only refer to in the vaguest terms possible. They were both extremely fashionable young persons, possessed of dowries, good looks, and various other charms, such as good birth, good manners, and the like; and it would be futile to deny that they took a lively interest in the doings of their world, however hollow and vain the cake appeared to them between two bites.
"Are you going to-night, Leonora dear?" they inquired as they left her.
"Of course," answered Miss Carnethy. "I must hear the rest of the 'Spencerian fallacy' you know!"
When Leonora was alone she had a great many things to think of.
The atmosphere had cleared during the last hour, so far as philosophy was concerned, and as she looked at herself in the glass, she was wondering how she should look in the evening. Not vainly,--at least, not so vainly as most girls with her advantages might have thought,--but reflectively, the English side of her twofold nature having gained the upper hand. For as she gazed into her own blue eyes, trying to search and fathom her own soul, she was conscious of something that gave her pleasure and hope,--something which she had treated scornfully enough in her thoughts that very afternoon.