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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: the cost, and Castanier therefore always took the "nicest."
When once the standard had been set up, there was nothing for it but
everything in the household must be in conformity, from the linen,
plate, and crystal through a thousand and one items of expenditure
down to the pots and pans in the kitchen. Castanier had meant to "do
things simply," as the saying goes, but he gradually found himself
more and more in debt. One expense entailed another. The clock called
for candle sconces. Fires must be lighted in the ornamental grates,
but the curtains and hangings were too fresh and delicate to be soiled
by smuts, so they must be replaced by patent and elaborate fireplaces,
warranted to give out no smoke, recent inventions of the people who
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