“Don’t steal rolls.”

Stepan Arkadyevitch laughed outright.

“Oh, moralist! But you must understand, there are two women: one insists only on her rights, and those rights are your love, which you can’t give her; and the other sacrifices everything for you and asks for nothing. What are you to do? How are you to act? There’s a fearful tragedy in it.”

“If you care for my profession of faith as regards that, I’ll tell you that I don’t believe there was any tragedy about it. And this is why. To my mind, love⁠ ⁠… both the sorts of love, which you remember Plato defines in his Banquet, served as the test of men. Some men only understand one sort, and some only the other. And those who only know the non-platonic love have no need to talk of tragedy. In such love there can be no sort of tragedy. ‘I’m much obliged for the gratification, my humble respects’⁠—that’s all the tragedy. And in platonic love there can be no tragedy, because in that love all is clear and pure, because.⁠ ⁠…”