Page:Letters of Mlle. de Lespinasse.djvu/32

Rh, insipid calmness. "I lived," she says, "but I seemed to be apart from myself." She tells M. de Guibert that she hates him, but we know what that means: "You know well that when I hate you it is that I love you to a degree of passion that overthrows my reason."

Her life is thus passed in loving, hating, fainting, reviving, dying; that is to say, in ever loving. Each crisis ends by a pardon, a reconciliation, a closer and more violent clasp. M. de Guibert thinks of his fortune and his establishment; she concerns herself with them for his sake. Yes, she concerns herself about his marriage. When he marries (for he has the face to marry in the very midst of this passion) she takes an interest in it; she praises the young wife, whom she meets. Alas! it may be to that generous praise that we owe the preservation of these Letters, which ought in those rival hands to have been annihilated. It might be supposed that this marriage of M. de Guibert would end all; the noble, demented soul thinks so herself; but no! passion laughs at social impossibilities and barriers. She continues, therefore, in spite of all, to love M. de Guibert, without asking more of him than to let himself be loved. After many struggles, the last day finds their intercourse restored as though nothing had been broken between them. But she feels herself dying; she redoubles the use of opium; she desires to live only from day to day, without a future—has passion a future? "I feel the need of being loved to-day, and only to-day; let us blot from our dictionary the words 'always' and 'forever.

The last of these Letters are but a piercing cry, with rare intermissions. One could scarcely imagine into what inexhaustible forms she puts the same sentiment; the river of fire o'erflows at every step in flashing torrents. Let us give the summary in her own language:—