And then, I ask myself, will the new world
for which I have embarked receive me? I have left one in which I was
loved and made much of. And my mother, to think of whom was formerly
sufficient to solace me in my troubles, was now the cause of my most
poignant grief. I was, as it were, stabbing her with a knife. O God!
was it then necessary that the path of duty should be so stony? I
shall be derided by public opinion, and with all that the future
unfolded itself before me pale and colourless. Ambition was powerless
to remove the veil of sadness and regrets which infolded my heart. I
cursed the fate which had enveloped me in such fatal contradictions.
Moreover, the gross and pressing requirements of material existence
had to be faced. I envied the fate of the simple souls who are born,
who live and who die without stir or thought, merely following the
current as it takes them, worshipping a God whom they call their
Father. How I detested my reason for having bereft me of my dreams. I
passed some time each evening in the church of St. Sulpice, and there
I did my best to believe, but it was of no use. Yes, these days will
indeed count in my lifetime, for if they were not the most decisive,
they were assuredly the most painful. It was a hard thing to
re-commence life from the beginning, at the age of three and twenty.
I could scarcely realise the possibility of my having to fight my way
through the motley crowd of turbulent and ambitious persons. Timid as
I am, I was ever tempted to select a plain and common-place career,
which I might have ennobled inwardly.
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