CHAPTER VIII.
VIOLET WRITES AGAIN.
Les lettres d'amour ne portent l'émotion que dans le cœur qui inspire et qui partage le feu qui les a dictées. Par elles-mêmes elles se ressemblent toutes: mais chaque être épris d'amour trouve dans celle qui lui est adressée une puissance irrésistible, une nouveauté incomparable.
GEORGE SAND.—La Comtesse de Rudolstadt.
Your letter, dearest Marmaduke, was a great joy to me, but the joy was dashed with pain as I came to the close, and read there the hope you express of our speedy union. No, that cannot be. Oh, do you not feel that it cannot be? do you not feel that it does not depend upon my love, but upon the irrevocable past? I thought I had made you understand all my feelings on this unhappy subject, and that I might write to you freely without awakening in either of us a hope which cannot be gratified. Your letter has greatly pained me; pained me because you seem to think that, inasmuch as we both love, we must be united—that love will bear down all obstacles and triumph at last. But no; that cannot be. If there were the remotest chance of it, do you think I should not catch at such a hope with all the impatient eagerness of love? Have I nothing to subdue? Have I no temptations to overcome? Think, Marmaduke, my noble Marmaduke, think of what I have suffered and must still suffer when I look upon our fate, and yet can say, am forced to say, we must never meet! I fled from London, fled from you, because I feared the insidious counsels of my heart. My reason tells me that I acted rightly—do you not feel so too?
I had looked forward to this correspondence with such longing! I had pictured all the rapture it would give us both; and see! the first letter from you rips up old wounds, and draws from me bitter, bitter tears.
It must cease, unless you can accept my hard conditions. It must cease, Marmaduke, for I dare not let it continue. I could not trust myself—I should allow myself to be persuaded—your hopes would become my hopes—your prayers would melt my resolution. I know it. I know my own heart; I know its strength and its weakness, and I feel that it would be madness in me to expose myself to the temptation of corresponding with you on that subject. You would defeat me at last; and I must not, I will not be defeated! Therefore, promise me at once to accept my conditions, promise to love me as one whom an inevitable fate has separated from you, and for ever. Let us at the outset understand the relation which can alone exist between us. We love, but we must love without hope. Let us accept our fate—a fate which our murmurs or our struggles cannot alter, and in this resignation our love will be as a guiding star to light us through life; let our souls blend into one; let our hearts never be separated, and we shall live together in spirit, though distant from each other. This is not the happy lot which might have been ours, but it is the happiest which remains for us. Isolated we shall be; without home, without family; but life will still have one sacred feeling one immeasurable delight, and above the turmoils and petty cares of the world there will be a heaven for us.
Will you accept my love upon such terms? Will you struggle with yourself as I have struggled, and conquer as I have conquered?
I may seem cold in writing thus! Oh, do not think it; do not think that this conquest has been lightly made! I love you, love you with the passionate excess of a fervid nature: but the stern necessities of our condition imprison me in this reserve. It is because I see no outlet that I am so firm; and it is only since I have clearly seen my lot is inevitable that I have learned to be calm and happy. Write to me without delay, write to tell me that you do not misunderstand me—that you do not think me cold: oh, you cannot think that! Write to me to tell me that you see, as I see, how our only chance of happiness is in resignation—in love without hope. Write to me to tell me that my love will be as a star to you in your ambitious career, and that when the busy day is done, and night with all its deep repose comes on, your thoughts will then rise from the occupations of the day to that serener sphere where souls commingle. For my love will be this to you, dearest; I know it, since I interpret my own heart for you.
VIOLET.