Page:Letters of Mlle. de Lespinasse.djvu/139

120 happiness ; I could love you no longer ; I abhorred the mo- ments of pleasure and consolation which I owed to you. You had snatched me from death, the sole resource, the sole sup- port which I had promised myself when I trembled for the life of M. de Mora, You made me survive that dreadful moment ; you filled my soul with remorse, and you made me experience a gi-eater misfortune still — that of hating you ; yes, mon ami, hating you. For eight days I was filled by that horrible sentiment, although during that time I received your letter from Chartres. The need of knowing how you were in health made me break a resolution I had formed to open no more of your letters. You told me that you were well ; you informed me that, in spite of my request, you had taken some of my letters, and you quoted a verse from " Zaire," which seemed to sneer at my unhappiness ; and then — what hurt me most of all — the regrets expressed in the letter seemed vague, and more fitted to relieve your soul than to touch mine. In a word, I made poison of all you said to me, and more than ever I resolved not to love you, and to open no more of your letters. I kept that reso- lution, which rent my heart and made me ill. Since your departure I am changed and shrunken as if I had had a great illness. Ah ! this fever of the soul, which rises to delirium, is indeed a cruel illness ; there is no bodily frame robust enough to bear such suffering. Mon ami, pity me ; you have done me harm.

I received your letter from Eochambeau only on Saturday. I did not open it, and as I put it away in my portfolio, my heart beat violently : but I commanded myself to be strong, and I was. Ah ! how much it cost me to keep that letter unopened ! how many times I read the address ! how often I held it in my hands ! at night, even, I felt the need of touching it. In the excess of my weakness I told myself I was