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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Black Dwarf by Walter Scott: of cold-blooded stoicism, or, at least, of friendly partiality.
But look at every book which we have read, those excepted of that
abstract philosophy which feels no responsive voice in our
natural feelings. Is not personal form, such as at least can be
tolerated without horror and disgust, always represented as
essential to our ideas of a friend, far more a lover? Is not
such a mis-shapen monster as I am, excluded, by the very fiat of
Nature, from her fairest enjoyments? What but my wealth prevents
all--perhaps even Letitia, or you--from shunning me as something
foreign to your nature, and more odious, by bearing that
distorted resemblance to humanity which we observe in the animal
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