Page:Letters of Mlle. de Lespinasse.djvu/151

132 Saturday, eleven o'clock at night. Here is your answer: it is such as I could have wished, cold and restrained. Mon ami, we shall now understand each other ; my soul is in the key of yours ; my letter did not ojffend you; you have judged marvellously well; you have had over me the advantage of a reasonable man over an impassioned nature. You had coolness, I had frenzy, but it was the last paroxysm of a dreadful malady, of which one had better die than recover, because the violence of these fits of fever blasts and lays low the strength of the unhappy patient — but enough, too much, no doubt, on what you call my " injustice " and your " delicacy." Mon ami, do you know what is delicate ? It would have been to suppress the six or seven pages you had written me before you received my letter.

What superiority reason has over passion! how it rules conduct ! It brings and sheds peace on aU ; in a word, it is so decorous, so circumspect, that I ought to thank you to-day for what you have said and what you have not said to me. Mon ami, your Friday letter is amiable ; it is gentle, obliging, reasonable ; it has the tone and charm of confidence ; but it is sad, and I am sorry if that is the disposition of your soul. I have not in me the wherewithal to rouse you ; I have not even the strength to talk with you to-night. Adieu ! you expect no further news of me, do you ? Monday evening, September 19, 1774. I wish to write to you. I want to answer you ; if I miss to-morrow's courier I must wait till Saturday; meanwhile my soul is dead. I have just re-read your letter ; I thought it would revive me, but not so. ... I feel an awful sterility within me, and if I were to let myself go this is how I should answer you : " All the reflections that you make on