Waste / A Tragedy, In Four Acts

[Dealing with the impertinence in her own fashion.] What would make you marry me? Don't say: Nothing on earth.

Trebell. [Speaking apparently of someone else.] A prolonged fit of idleness might make me marry ... a clever woman. But I've never been idle for more than a week. And I've never met a clever woman ... worth calling a woman.

Blackborough. [Vigorously making his point.] Then what would be the conditions of your remaining? You're not a party man, Trebell. You haven't the true party feeling. You are to be bought. Of course you take your price in measures, not in money. But you are preeminently a man of ideas ... an expert. And a man of ideas is often a grave embarrassment to a government.