But to hunt down consideration and reputation
--to force the esteem of others--seemed to me an effort unworthy of
myself, almost a degradation. A struggle with unfavorable opinion has
seemed to me beneath me, for all the while my heart has been full of
sadness and disappointment, and I have known and felt that I have been
systematically and deliberately isolated. Untimely despair and the
deepest discouragement have been my constant portion. Incapable of
taking any interest in my talents for their own sake, I let everything
slip as soon as the hope of being loved for them and by them had
forsaken me. A hermit against my will, I have not even found peace in
solitude, because my inmost conscience has not been any better satisfied
than my heart."
Still one may no doubt easily exaggerate this loneliness of Amiel's. His
social difficulties represent rather a dull discomfort in his life,
which in course of time, and in combination with a good many other
causes, produced certain unfavorable results on his temperament and on
his public career, than anything very tragic and acute. They were real,
and he, being what he was, was specially unfitted to cope with and
conquer them. But he had his friends, his pleasures, and even to some
extent his successes, like other men.
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