But let us cast away these fears, the creation, no doubt, of vanity. Let us not make of Pepita a Phædra, or of me a Hippolytus.
What in reality begins to surprise me is my father's carelessness and complete consciousness of security. Pardon my pride, ask Heaven to pardon it; for at times this consciousness of security piques and offends me. What! I say to myself, is there something so absurd in the thought that it should not even occur to my father that, notwithstanding my supposed sanctity, or perhaps because of my supposed sanctity, I should, without wishing it, inspire Pepita with love?
There is an ingenious method of reasoning by which I explain to myself, without wounding my vanity, my father's carelessness in this important particular. My father, although he has no reason for doing so, begins to regard himself already in the light of Pepita's husband, and to share in that fatal blindness with which Asmodeus, or some other yet more malicious demon, afflicts husbands. Profane and ecclesiastical history is fall of instances of this blindness, which God permits, no doubt, for providential purposes. The most remarkable example of it, perhaps, is that of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, who had for wife a woman so vile as Faustina, and yet so wise a man and so great a philosopher remained in ignorance to the end of his days of what was known to every one else in the Roman Empire; so that in the meditations or memoirs of himself that he composed he gives infinite thanks to the immortal gods for having bestowed upon him so faithful and so good a wife; thus provoking the smiles of his contemporaries and of future generations.
Every day since then we see examples of great men and men of exalted rank who make those who enjoy the favor of their wives their private secretaries, and bestow honors on them. Thus do I explain to myself my father's indifference and his failure to suspect that, even against my own will, it would be possible for him to find a rival in me.
Would it be a want of respect on my part, should I fall into the fault of presumption or insolence, if I were to warn my father of the danger which he himself does not see? But he gives me no opportunity to say anything to him. Besides, what could I say to him? That once or twice I fancy Pepita has looked at me in a way different from that in which she usually does? May not this be an illusion of mine? No; I have not the least proof that Pepita desires to play the coquette with me.
What, then, could I tell my father? Shall I say to him that it is I who am in love with Pepita; that I covet the treasure he already regards as his own? This is not the truth; and, above all, how could I tell this to my father, even if, to my misfortune and through my fault, it were the truth?
The best course I can adopt is to say nothing; to combat the temptation in silence, if it should indeed assail me, and to endeavor, as soon as possible, to leave this place and return to you.
May 19th.
I return thanks to Heaven and to you for the letters and the counsels you have lately sent me. To-day I need them more than ever.
The mystical and learned St. Theresa is right in dwelling upon the suffering of timid souls that allow themselves to be disturbed by temptation; but a thousand times worse than that suffering is the awakening from error of those who, like me, have permitted themselves to indulge in arrogance and self-confidence.