"How I was repulsed, how disappointed, you know, or could divine if
you did not know; for all but me have been trained to bear the burden
from their youth up, and accustomed to have the individual will
fettered for the advantage of society. For the same reason, you cannot
guess the silent fury that filled my mind when I at last found that I
had struggled in vain, and that I must remain in the bondage that I
had ignorantly put on.
"My affections were totally alienated from my family, for I felt they
had known what I had not, and had neither put me on my guard, nor
warned me against precipitation whose consequences must be fatal. I
saw, indeed, that they did not look on life as I did, and could be
content without being happy; but this observation was far from making
me love them more. I felt alone, bitterly, contemptuously alone. I
hated men who had made the laws that bound me. I did not believe in
God; for why had He permitted the dart to enter so unprepared a
breast? I determined never to submit, though I disdained to struggle,
since struggle was in vain. In passive, lonely wretchedness I would
pass my days. I would not feign what I did not feel, nor take the hand
which had poisoned for me the cup of life before I had sipped the
first drops.
Pages:
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255