The Sign of Four

by Arthur Conan Doyle

“My mind,” he said, “rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram, or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial stimulants.

I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for mental exaltation. That is why I have chosen my own particular profession, or rather created it, for I am the only one in the world.”

I claim no credit in such cases. My name figures in no newspaper. The work itself, the pleasure of finding a field for my peculiar powers, is my highest reward.

Detection is, or ought to be, an exact science and should be treated in the same cold and un- emotional manner. You have attempted to tinge it with romanticism, which produces much the same effect as if you worked a love-story or an elopement into the fifth proposition of Euclid.”

Eliminate all other factors, and the one which remains must be the truth.”

I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for?

HE WAS BRIGHT, EAGER, AND in excellent spirits, a mood which in his case alternated with fits of the blackest depression.

“How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?