Oh, yes, yes, I bless you in my own name, and in the name of three generations of irreproachable men, who say through me, "The edifice which misfortune has destroyed, Providence may build up again." On seeing me die such a death, the most inexorable will have pity on you. To you, perhaps, they will accord the time they have refused to me. Then do your best to keep our name free from dishonour. Go to work, labour, young man, struggle ardently and courageously; live, yourself, your mother and sister, with the most rigid economy, so that from day to day the property of those whom I leave in your hands may augment and fructify. Reflect how glorious a day it will be, how grand, how solemn, that day of complete restoration, on which you will say in this very office, 'My father died because he could not do what I have this day done; but he died calmly and peaceably, because in dying he knew what I should do.' 'My father, my father!' cried the young man, 'why should you not live?' - 'If I live, all would be changed; if I live, interest would be converted into doubt, pity into hostility; if I live, I am only a man who has broken his word, failed in his engagements - in fact, only a bankrupt. if, on the contrary, I die, remember, Maximillian, my corpse is that of an honest but unfortunate man. Living, my best friends would avoid my house; dead, all Marseilles will follow me in tears to my last home. Living, you would feel shame at my name; dead, you may raise your head and say, "I am the son of him you killed, because, for the first time, he has been compelled to break his word.

— Alexandre Dumas

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#honor #integrity #the-count-of-monte-cristo #change