I

to them⁠ ⁠… too near, too near⁠ ⁠… prosperity and kindliness, prosperous fresh laughing faces, easily bought clothes, the manner of the large noisy house and large secure income, free movement in an accessible world, all turned to dangerous weapons in wrong hands by the unfinished, insensitive mouths, the ugly slur in the speech, the shapelessness of bearing, the naively visible thoughts, circumscribed by business, the illustrated monthly magazines, the summer month at the seaside; their lives were exactly like their way of walking down the street, a confident blind trampling. Speech was not needed to reveal their certainties; they shed certainty from every angle of their unfinished persons. Certainty about everything. Incredulous contempt for all uncertainty. Impatient contempt for all who could not stand up for themselves. Cheerful uncritical affection for each other. And for all who were living or trying to live just as they did⁠ ⁠…