Excerpt from The Invisible Hand: A Drama in Three Acts Edward (alone. He is seated near the easel, and slowly passes his hands over his eyes). I have been sleeping, 1 think. My head is heavy, and my eyes tired. Oh! nature will have her rights; and yet, I have so much need to work! I spent all day yesterday running about trying, and, alas! in vain, to overcome the obstacles that prevent my picture from appearing at the next exhibition. Everywhere I found either indifference or ill-will. Those men who made me wait more than an hour for an unfavorable answer, what did it matter to them that I thus lost at once my time and my trouble? And yet the time of the poor man ought to be sacred; in making him lose it, we take from him his bread, his means of living, and he may be obliged to snatch from sleep the hours we have forced him to waste. (He begins to painty A few more rubs of the brush, and this picture will be finished. Ah! I have often regretted that I began it, that I gave this dying old man on my easel the features of my father; but how could I avoid reproducing what is so often present to my mind? My poor father!. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.