And now listen to me in turn. You have touched me more profoundly than I thought even you could have touched me—my heart was full when you came here to-day. Henceforward I am yours for everything but to do you harm—and I am yours too much, in my heart, ever to consent to do you harm in that way. If I could consent to do it, not only should I be less loyal ... but in one sense, less yours. I say this to you without drawback and reserve, because it is all I am able to say, and perhaps all I shall be able to say. However this may be, a promise goes to you in it that none, except God and your will, shall interpose between you and me, ... I mean, that if He should free me within a moderate time from the trailing chain of this weakness, I will then be to you whatever at that hour you shall choose ... whether friend or more than friend ... a friend to the last in any case. So it rests with God and with you—only in the meanwhile you are most absolutely free ... 'unentangled' (as they call it) by the breadth of a thread—and if I did not know that you considered yourself so, I would not see you any more, let the effort cost me what it might. You may force me feel: ... but you cannot force me to think contrary to my first thought ... that it were better for you to forget me at once in one relation. And if better for you, can it be bad for me? which flings me down on the stone-pavement of the logicians.
And now if I ask a boon of you, will you forget afterwards that it ever was asked? I have hesitated a great deal; but my face is down on the stone-pavement—no—I will not ask to-day—It shall be for another day—and may God bless you on this and on those that come after, my dearest friend.
R.B. to E.B.B.
[Post-mark, September 27, 1845.]
Think for me, speak for me, my dearest, my own! You that are all great-heartedness and generosity, do that one more generous thing?
God bless you for
R.B.
What can it be you ask of me!—'a boon'—once my answer to that had been the plain one—but now ... when I have better experience of—No, now I have best experience of how you understand my interests; that at last we both know what is my true good—so ask, ask! My own, now! For there it is!—oh, do not fear I am 'entangled'—my crown is loose on my head, not nailed there—my pearl lies in my hand—I may return it to the sea, if I will!
What is it you ask of me, this first asking?