Hans Castorp demurred⁠—yet said something anyhow, Naphta as well as Settembrini listening with a certain suspense: “From what you say, Herr Naphta, you must sympathize with my cousin’s profession, and understand his impatience to be at it. As for me I am an out-and-out civilian, my cousin often reproaches me with it. I have never seen service; I am a child of peace, pure and simple, and have even sometimes thought of becoming a clergyman⁠—ask my cousin if I haven’t said as much to him many a time! But for all that, and aside from my personal inclinations⁠—or even, perhaps, not altogether aside from them⁠—I have some understanding and sympathy for a military life. It has such an infernally serious side to it, sort of ascetic, as you say⁠—that was the expression you used, wasn’t it? The military always has to reckon on coming to grip with death, just as the clergy has. That is why there is so much discipline and decorum and regularity in the army, so much ‘Spanish etiquette,’ if I may say so; and it makes no great difference whether one wears a uniform collar or a starched ruff, the main thing is the asceticism, as you so beautifully said.⁠—I don’t know if I’ve succeeded in making my train of thought quite⁠—”