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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: a few epigrams in the form of sketches, in which the harmless jest was
in such good taste that Sommervieux could not take offence; and even
if they had been more severe, these pleasantries were after all only
reprisals from his friends. Still, nothing could seem a trifle to a
spirit so open as Theodore's to impressions from without. A coldness
insensibly crept over him, and inevitably spread. To attain conjugal
happiness we must climb a hill whose summit is a narrow ridge, close
to a steep and slippery descent: the painter's love was falling down
it. He regarded his wife as incapable of appreciating the moral
considerations which justified him in his own eyes for his singular
behavior to her, and believed himself quite innocent in hiding from
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