Explore "Hadrian the Seventh" by Frederick Rolfe on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
When the door was shut, Hadrian remained quite motionless on the throne; and set Himself to review what He had said. He wondered whether He for once had got-down to and laid-bare the root of the matter: whether He for once had made His argument clear and convincing.
-- Good God! Who even could hope to be convincing? -- He flung the thing away from Him; and forever closed that volume of the book of His life.