TO C.P----
I have no answer from her.I'm mad.I wish you to call on M----in confidence,to say I intend to make her an offer of my hand,and that Iwill write to her father to that effect the instant I am free,and ask him whether he thinks it will be to any purpose,and what he would advise me to do.
UNALTERED LOVE
"Love is not love that alteration finds:Oh no!it is an ever-fixed mark,That looks on tempests and is never shaken."Shall I not love her for herself alone,in spite of fickleness and folly?To love her for her regard to me,is not to love her,but myself.She has robbed me of herself:shall she also rob me of my love of her?Did I not live on her smile?Is it less sweet because it is withdrawn from me?Did I not adore her every grace?Does she bend less enchantingly,because she has turned from me to another?Is my love then in the power of fortune,or of her caprice?No,I will have it lasting as it is pure;and I will make a Goddess of her,and build a temple to her in my heart,and worship her on indestructible altars,and raise statues to her:and my homage shall be unblemished as her unrivalled symmetry of form;and when that fails,the memory of it shall survive;and my bosom shall be proof to scorn,as hers has been to pity;and I will pursue her with an unrelenting love,and sue to be her slave,and tend her steps without notice and without reward;and serve her living,and mourn for her when dead.And thus my love will have shewn itself superior to her hate;and I shall triumph and then die.This is my idea of the only true and heroic love!Such is mine for her.
