Dear Lucie:
I have just at this instant received your three letters of the month of June and all the letters from the family, and it is under the impression, always keen, always poignant, that so many sweet souvenirs evoke in me, so many appalling sufferings also, that I will answer.
I will tell you once more, first all my profound affection, all my immense tenderness, all my admiration, for your noble character; then I will open all my soul to you, and I will tell you your duty, your right, that right that you should renounce only with your life. And this right, this duty, that is equally imprescriptible for my country as for you, is to will it that the light shall shine full and entire upon this horrible drama; it is to will without weakening, without boasting, but with indomitable energy, that our name, the name that our dear children bear, shall be washed free from this horrible stain.
And this object, this end, you, Lucie, you all should attain it, like good and valiant French men and women who are suffering martyrdom, but not one of whom, no matter what bitter outrages he has suffered, has ever forgotten his duty to his country for one single instant. And the day when the light shall shine, when the whole truth shall be revealed—as it must be, for neither time, patience, nor effort of the will should be counted in working for such an end—ah, well! if I am no longer with you, it will be for you to wash my name from this new outrage, so undeserved, that nothing has ever justified; and I repeat it, whatever may have been my sufferings, however atrocious may have been the tortures inflicted upon me—tortures that I cannot forget, tortures that can be excused only by the passions that sometimes lead men astray—I have never forgotten that far above men, far above their passions, far above their errors, is our country. It is she that will be my final judge.
To be an honest man does not wholly consist in being incapable of stealing a hundred sous from the pocket of a neighbor; to be an honest man, I say, is to be able always to see one’s reflection in that mirror that forgets nothing, that sees everything, that knows everything; to be able to see one’s self, in a word, in one’s conscience with the certitude of having always and everywhere done one’s duty. That certitude I have.
Then, dear and good Lucie, do your duty bravely, pitilessly, as a good and valiant Frenchwoman who is suffering martyrdom, but who is resolved that the name she bears, the name that her children bear, shall be cleansed from this horrible stain. The light must break out, it must shine in all its brilliancy. The limitations of time should no longer be anything to you.
Indeed, I know too well that the sentiments that animate me are cherished by you all; they are common to all of us, to your dear family as to my own.
I cannot speak to you of the children; besides, I know you too well to doubt for one single instant the manner in which you will bring them up. Never leave them; be with them always, heart and soul; listen to them always, however importunate may be their questions.
As I have often told you, to educate children is not merely to assure their material life, nor even their intellectual life, but it is also to assure to them the support that they should find in their parents, the confidence with which the latter should inspire them, the certainty that they should always have that there is one place where they can unburden their hearts, where they can forget their pains, their sorrows, no matter how little, how trivial they may sometimes appear.
In these last lines I would put once more all my deep love for you, for our dear children, for your dear parents, for you all, all those whom I love from the bottom of my heart, for all the friends whose thoughts for me I divine, whose unalterable devotion I know; and I would say to you again and again, Courage, courage! I would tell you that nothing should shake your will; that high above my life hovers the one supreme care—the honor of my name, of the name you bear, the name our children bear.