“No, Edward, I should have something else to do with it.”

“Perhaps, then, you would bestow it as a reward on that person who wrote the ablest defence of your favourite maxim, that no one can ever be in love more than once in their life⁠—your opinion on that point is unchanged, I presume?”

“Undoubtedly. At my time of life opinions are tolerably fixed. It is not likely that I should now see or hear anything to change them.”

“Marianne is as steadfast as ever, you see,” said Elinor, “she is not at all altered.”

“She is only grown a little more grave than she was.”

“Nay, Edward,” said Marianne, “ you need not reproach me. You are not very gay yourself.”