Letters to Ferrand and Louis Berlioz from
1858 to 1863.
To Humbert Ferrand.
“November 1858.—I have nothing to tell you, I simply want to write. I am ill, miserable (how many I’s to each line!) Always I and me! One’s friends are for oneself, it ought to be oneself for one’s friends.
“My dejection melts away as I write; for pity’s sake let us write oftener! These years of silence are insupportable.
“Think how horribly quickly we are dying and how much good your letters do me!
“Last night I dreamt of music, this morning I recalled it all and fell into one of those supernal ecstasies.... All the tears of my soul poured forth as I listened to those divinely sonorous smiles that radiate from the angels alone. Believe me, dear friend, the being who could write such miracles of transcendent melody would be more than mortal.
“So sings great Michael as, erect upon the threshold of the empyrean, he dreamily gazes down upon the worlds beneath.
“Why, oh, why! have I not such an orchestra that I, too, could sing this archangelic song!
“Back to this lower earth! I am interrupted. Vulgar, commonplace, stupid life! Oh! that I had a hundred cannon to fire all at once!
“Good-bye. I feel better. Forgive me!”