"And what, my Thyrsis, is the name you give this pleasing pain?"
"It is called love," said Thyrsis.
"Ah!" responded the maiden, "that is a beautiful name. Tell me by what signs I may know it, if it come to me. What are the feelings it gives one?"
Thyrsis, taking heart of grace, replied with much ardour: "One feels an anguish beside which the joys of kings are but dull and insipid. One forgets oneself, and takes pleasure in the solitudes of the woods. To glance into a brook is to see, not oneself, but an ever-haunting image. To any other form one's eyes are blind. It may be that there is a shepherd in the village at whose voice, at the mention of whose name, you will blush; at the thought of whom you will sigh. Why, one knows not! To see him will be a burning desire, and yet you would shrink from him."
"Oho!" said Amaranth. "Is this then the pain you have preached so much! It is hardly new to me. I seem to know something of it." The heart of Thyrsis leapt, for he thought that at last he had gained his end; when the fair one added, "'Tis just in this way that I feel for Cladimant!"
Imagine the vexation and misery of poor Thyrsis!
How many like him, intending to work solely for themselves, prove only to have been stepping stones for others.