Without Dogma: A Novel of Modern Poland

by Henryk Sienkiewicz

I understood all perfectly, but I could not help feeling very sore, and my pessimism says: "It is you who pay the score; you give everything, without getting anything in return; you are deceived in thinking her soul belongs to you; even that soul remains a blank to you; then what do you possess?"

I admit the truthfulness of the utterance, but still I count upon the future.

17 August.

I am often reminded of the poet Mickiewicz's words, "Alas! it was only a half-salvation!" But even if I did not see in that half-salvation all that is wanting, I could not arrive at perfect peace. This would be achieved only by not desiring anything more, in other words by ceasing to love. There come upon me, more and more, moments of despondency when I say to myself that this is only another enchanted circle. I found some relief from torments I could bear no longer, that is true; but relief is not the same as the removal of the pain. When the famished Arab sucks pebbles instead of drinking water, he does not satisfy his thirst; he only deceives it. Query: Do I deceive my self? There are again two persons within me: the spectator and the actor; and the one criticises and mocks the other. The sceptic Ploszowski, the Ploszowski who has no settled and unshakable belief in the existence of a soul, in love with a soul, appears simply ridiculous to that critical number two. What is, after all, my relation with Aniela? Sometimes I see in it merely the product of a diseased imagination. I am now indeed like the bird that drags one wing on the earth. I have doomed to paralysis one half of my being, live only half a life, and love with half a love. It is a vain enterprise. To separate desire from love is as impossible as to separate thought from existence. Even religious feelings, the most ideal of all feelings, manifest themselves by words, by songs, by kneeling, and kissing of sacred objects; and I would deprive the love for a woman of all embodiment, sever all connection with the earth, and make it live upon earth in a transmundane shape! Love is a natural tendency and desire. What did I take away from it? The tendency and the desire. I might as well have gone to Aniela, and said to her, "Since I love you above everything, I pledge myself to love you no longer."

There is some terrible mistake in this. I had truly lost my way in the desert; no wonder that I saw a Fata Morgana.

18 August.

Yesterday I felt oppressed and troubled by various thoughts. I could not sleep. I left off plunging into the depths of pessimism, and instead of that began to think of Aniela and call her image before my eyes. This always soothes me. My imagination strained to the utmost point brings her before me so lifelike that I fancy I could speak to her. I recalled to memory the time I had met her first as a grown-up girl. I saw the white, gauzy draperies studded with bunches of violets, the bare shoulders, and the face a little too small but fresh like a spring morning, and so original in the bold outline of the eyebrows, the long lashes, and that soft down on either side of the face. It seems to me as if I still heard her voice saying, "Do you not recognize me, Leon?" I wrote at the time that her face appeared to me like music translated into human features. There was in her at the same time the charm of the maiden and the attraction of the woman. No other woman ever fascinated me so strongly, and there must needs cross my way a Circe-like Laura to lure me away from the one woman I could love, almost my bride.

Nobody feels more than I that the words, "The spell thou hast cast upon me lasts forever," are not a mere poetic fancy, but bitter reality. Besides love and desire, I have for her an immense liking, the tenderness of affection, and am drawn to her with the irresistible force of the magnet to iron. And it cannot be otherwise, for she is still the same Aniela, and is not changed in the least. It is the same face of a little girl, with the charm of a woman, the same look, the same eyelashes, brows, shoulders, and supple waist. She has now one more charm,—that of the lost Paradise.

What a tremendous gulf between our relations in the past and those in the present. When I think of the Aniela who was waiting, as for her salvation, to hear from me the words, "Will you be mine?" I can scarcely believe it to have been true. Reflecting upon that, I feel like the ruined magnate who at one time scattered his wealth about, dazzling the world by his splendor, and in later years lived upon charity.

That night, when I thought about Aniela and evoked her image before my eyes, it suddenly occurred to me that we had no portrait of her, and a strong desire seized me to have her likeness. I grasped at the idea with enthusiasm, and it made me feel so happy that it finally drove all sleep from my eyes. "I shall have you," I said; "I shall be able to look at you at any time, kiss your hands, your eyes, your lips; and you will not be able to prevent it." I began at once to think how it might be done. I could not go and say to Aniela, "Have your portrait painted, and I will defray the expenses;" but with my aunt I could always do what I liked, and a hint will be enough to make her wish for Aniela's portrait. At Ploszow she has a whole collection of family portraits, which are her pride, and my desperation, as some of them are truly hideous; but my aunt will not have them removed out of sight. Considering her deep attachment to Aniela, I was sure she would be delighted with the idea of adding her picture to the collection. As far as she is concerned I consider the thing done; but now came the question whom to intrust with the execution of the portrait. I thought it would be impossible to induce the ladies to take Paris on their way; there I should have the choice between the accuracy and objectivism of Bonnat, the bold breadth of Carolus Duran, and the inimitable sweetness of Chaplin. Shutting my eyes, I imagined how each of them would acquit himself of the task, and I was pleased with the fancy. But I saw it was impracticable; I foresaw that my aunt would insist upon a Polish painter. I should have no objection to that, for I remembered seeing at the Warsaw and Cracow exhibition portraits as excellent as from the brush of any foreign painter. I was only afraid of the delay. As regards fancies, and also in many other things, there is something eminently feminine in my composition. When I plan a thing I want to get it done at once. As we were in Germany, not very far from Munich and Vienna, I began to choose among the German painters. I fixed upon two names: Lembach and Angeli. I had seen some fine portraits by Lembach, but only men's; besides, I did not like his self-assurance and sketchiness, which, as I am fond of French painting, I can endure only from a Frenchman. Angeli's faces did not altogether satisfy me, but I had to admit his delicacy of touch; and that is just the thing wanted for Aniela's face. Besides, in order to get Lembach we should have to go out of our way, and Angeli is on the way,—a circumstance one is ashamed to confess, not wanting to be regarded as a Philistine. But in this case I wanted to save time. "The dead ride quick," as the poet says; but lovers ride quicker still. Besides I should have chosen Angeli in any case, and finally decided that he should paint Aniela's portrait. As a rule, I do not approve of portraits in ball dress, but I resolved to have Aniela in a white dress with violets. I want to have the delusion in looking at her that she is the Aniela of the never-to-be-forgotten times. I do not want anything to remind me that she is Pani Kromitzka. And besides, the dress is dear to me as a memory.