“This makes thee indignant; but the other makes me—”
“Yes, for thou hast a kind of coffee-mill in thy head, which grinds, and grinds everything till it grinds it into fine dust. What dost thou want of love in general?”
“I, of love? I want nothing of love! Let the devil take him who wants anything of love! I have sharp pains in my shoulder-blades from it. But if I were other than I am, if I had to describe what love ought to be, if I wanted anything of it, then I should wish—“
“What? hop! jump over!”
“That it were composed in equal parts of desire and reverence.”
Then he drank a glass of cognac, and added after a while,—
“It seems to me that I have said something which may be wise, if it is not foolish. But it is all one to me.”
“No! it is not foolish.”
“As God lives, it is all one to me.”