It would interest me to prove to Magna who was right. If I could bring myself to reading through once more what I wrote down in those days ... yes, I will to-morrow.
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I am ashamed, oh, how ashamed I am! It is not fancy or forgery. I wrote every word of it in circumstances which bear witness to the honesty of the writer. I can never look either Magna or Jeanne in the face again ... or in my boy’s.
Not I who have a thousand times dreamed and wished with all my heart that I had brought him into the world! I can only hang my head now and be thankful that he never had such a person for his mother.
I, I, who strutted about like a peacock, proud of my own perfections; I, who pointed the finger of scorn at others; I, who presumed with the rights of a judge to condemn or pardon others, inwardly jubilating triumphantly, “Thank God I am not as other men are.”
That can never be erased, never made good.
Now that I have reached the evening of my days, and my one occupation is to sit and look out of the window at the people who pass, and dream happy dreams for my boy, I commit no thought or deed that needs the veil of oblivion.
But then, when I was in my prime ... when I might have applied my gifts for usefulness and pleasure—I was such a....
The memory of it can never be wiped out. It can never be made good.
And I had thought that Kelly was to read it all after my death, so that he might learn to know what I really was; learn to despise me as I lay in my grave.... I have had the fire lit though it is summer. I intend to destroy every line. Every line!