Page:Andreyev - A Dilemma (Brown, 1910).djvu/102

94 to dissimulation, already explained reasonably and fully, that inspired the plan. Madness? Is then genius really insanity? Cold-bloodedness? But is it absolutely necessary that a murderer should tremble, grow pale and be agitated? Cowards always tremble, even when embracing their servant-maids. Is then bravery madness?

How simply my own doubts of my health explain themselves! Like a true artist I threw myself too deeply into my rôle, identified myself temporarily with the represented character and for a moment lost my aptitude for self-account. Will you say that even in the courts, there is none who, playing among the lawyer-actors, struggling daily Othello, has felt the actual need to slay?

Sufficiently convincing, isn't it, most learned gentlemen? Do you not experience a strange consciousness of my seeming sanity when I try to prove my madness and the converse feeling of seeming madness—when I try to prove my normality?

Yes. That is because you do not believe