Gothard.
But he could write to you;--you would tell him where you were going.
IV. Claude to Eustace.
Let me, then, bear to forget her. I will not cling to her falsely:
Nothing factitious or forced shall impair the old happy relation.
I will let myself go, forget, not try to remember;
I will walk on my way, accept the chances that meet me,
Freely encounter the world, imbibe these alien airs, and
Never ask if new feelings and thoughts are of her or of others.
Is she not changing herself?--the old image would only delude me.
I will be bold, too, and change,--if it must be. Yet if in all things,
Yet if I do but aspire evermore to the Absolute only,
I shall be doing, I think, somehow, what she will be doing;--
I shall be thine, O my child, some way, though I know not in what way,
Let me submit to forget her; I must; I already forget her.
V. Claude to Eustace.
Utterly vain is, alas! this attempt at the Absolute,--wholly!
I, who believed not in her, because I would fain believe nothing,
Have to believe as I may, with a wilful, unmeaning acceptance.
I, who refused to enfasten the roots of my floating existence
In the rich earth, cling now to the hard, naked rock that is left me,--
Ah! she was worthy, Eustace,--and that, indeed, is my comfort,--
Worthy a nobler heart than a fool such as I could have given her.
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