I shall not forbear, therefore, and when I feel my heart bleeding from an unjust wound I shall go with respectful steps and recover myself in the world of solitude. I shall not ask in the name of justice, I shall not insist, I shall not importune; I shall wait until it manifests itself and sets me free, I shall wait until at last it bestows upon me the grace which, like a fine sap, like mother’s milk, it always contains.
Solitude! I can still conquer it among a hundred thousand chattering companions; I know how to sing to myself little songs that surround me with the silence of the steppes.
I will go back again to the ravine where, the whole summer long, a blackbird I know of whistles that same liquid song that grows purer and more perfect from week to week. Ten notes are his whole career and his reason for being. Perhaps on a day that music will be just what my soul needs to recover its flight, like a stranded bark which a lazy wave has just set floating.
I will go back to the spots where I have been happy, and I do not think this will be very imprudent; for, like the perfume a woman leaves in her garments, like a drop of wine in the bottom of a glass, a little happiness often remains attached to things.
I shall go out again behind the hamlet, where I know that every morning a couple of turtle-doves mingle a plaint that secretly cuts the silence, hollows it with a melodious tunnel.
And I shall stretch myself out there, my face to the sky, like a well-exposed vine that longs to ripen some fine fruit.
I am saying what I shall do, with the sole purpose, with the deep desire, that you will all do the same, and that you will each turn to your favorite star; and all this with the earnest desire that you will not be content to remain sheep marked, without redemption, for the knife.
It requires little at times. The soul is not more exacting than the body. I have seen exhausted soldiers whom a single swallow of brandy raised up again to the heights of courage. I have seen seriously wounded men brought back to life when their bodies were turned a little in order to facilitate the uncertain flow of the blood.
The soul is no less fragile, no less sensitive. If the western view keeps you sad, turn lightly to the south. We do not know what the divine world holds in store.