to TOM? His
letter is getting frayed and soiled from being constantly in my
pocket. Day after day it accompanies me on my daily round, unanswered
and seemingly unanswerable. For I feel it to be a duty to write, and
my mind abhors a duty. The letter weighs upon my conscience like lead.
A few strokes of the pen would remove the burden, but I simply cannot
screw myself up to the task. That is one of the things I ought to do.

Again, ought I not to call on the WHITTLESEAS? Mr. and Mrs. WHITTLESEA
have simply overflowed with kindness towards me. I never enjoyed
anything more than the week I spent at their house in Kent a short
time ago. They are now in town, and, what is more, they know that I am
in town too. Of course I ought to call. It's my plain duty, and that
is, as far as I can tell, the only reason which absolutely prevents
me from calling upon that hospitable family. Why need I go through
the long list of my pressing duties? I ought to write my article on
"Modern Theosophy: A Psychological Parallel," for the next number of
_The Brain_. I ought to visit my dentist; I ought to have my hair
cut. But I shall do none of these things. On the other hand, it is
absolutely unnecessary that I should write to you. No evil would
befall me if I waited another year, or even omitted altogether to
write to you. And that is the precise reason why I am now addressing
you. As a matter of fact, I like you. As I have already said, the
performance of strict duties is irksome to me. It is you, my dear
LAZINESS, who forbid me to perform them, and thus save me from many an
uncongenial task. That is why I like you.

And, after all, the common abuse of you is absurd. I have heard grave
and industrious persons declare emphatically that any one who allows
himself to fall under your sway debars himself utterly from every
chance of success. Fiddlesticks! I snap my fingers at such folly.
What do these gentlemen say to the case of FIGTREE, the great Q.C.?
Everybody knows that FIGTREE is, without exception, the most indolent
man in the world. Let any doubter walk down Middle Temple Lane and
ask the first young barrister he meets what he thinks of FIGTREE. I
am ready to wager my annual income that the reply will be, "What, Old
FIGTREE! Why, he's the laziest man at the Bar. I thought everybody
knew that." I may be told, of course, that FIGTREE appears in all the
big cases--that his management of them is extraordinarily successful;
that the Judges de