“That would be witty, rather than humorous,” Naphta retorted. “But in either case a good spirit to import into nature; and one of which she stands in need.”

“Nature,” said Settembrini, in a lower voice, not so much over as along his shoulder, “needs no importations of yours. She is Spirit herself.”

“Doesn’t your monism rather bore you?”

“Ah, you confess, then, that it is simply to divert yourself that you wrench God and nature apart, and divide the world into two hostile camps?”

“I find it most interesting to hear you characterize as love of diversion what I mean when I say Passion and Spirit.”

“And you, who put such large words to such empty uses, don’t forget that you sometimes reproach me for being rhetorical.”