Mathilda

If pain can purify the heart, mine will be pure.

A nymph of the woods such as you were,

My greatest pleasure was the enjoyment of a serene sky amidst these verdant woods: yet I loved all the changes of Nature; and rain, and storm, and the beautiful clouds of heaven brought their delights with them. When rocked by the waves of the lake my spirits rose in triumph as a horseman feels with pride the motions of his high fed steed. But my pleasures arose from the contemplation of nature alone, I had no companion: my warm affections finding no return from any other human heart were forced to run waste on inanimate objects.

I am in a strange state of mind. I am alone—quite alone—in the world—the blight of misfortune has passed over me and withered me; I know that I am about to die and I feel happy—joyous.—I feel my pulse; it beats fast: I place my thin hand on my cheek; it burns: there is a slight, quick spirit within me which is now emitting its last sparks. I shall never see the snows of another winter—I do believe that I shall never again feel the vivifying warmth of another summer sun; and it is in this persuasion that I begin to write my tragic history. Perhaps a history such as mine had better die with me, but a feeling that I cannot define leads me on and I am too weak both in body and mind to resist the slightest impulse. While life was strong within me I thought indeed that there was a sacred horror in my tale that rendered it unfit for utterance, and now about to die I pollute its mystic terrors. It is as the wood of the Eumenides none but the dying may enter; and Oedipus is about to die.

My warm affections finding no return... were forced to run waste on inanimate objects.

You are still, as you ever were, lovely, beautiful beyond expression.

I gained his secret and we were both lost for ever.

Believe me, I will never desert life until this last hope is torn from my bosom, that in some way my labours may form a link of gold with which we ought all to strive to drag Happiness from where she sits enthroned above the clouds, now far beyond our reach, to inhabit the earth with us.

In life I dared not; in death, I unveil the mystery.

I am alone – quite alone – in the world – the blight of misfortune has passed over me and withered me; I know that I am about to die and I feel happy – joyous.

In truth I am in love with death;

Believe me, if you beheld on lips with grief one smile of joy and gratitude, and knew that you were parent of that smile and that without you it had never been, you would feel so pure and warm a happiness that you'd wish to live forever again and again to enjoy the same pleasure.

Misery was my element, and nothing but what was miserable could approach me;

I was at peace before you came; why have you disturbed me? You have given me new wants and now your trifle with me as if my heart were as whole as yours [...]

I wished for one heart in which I could pour unrestrained my plaints, and by the heavenly nature of the soil blessed fruit might spring from such bad seed. Yet how could I find this? The love that is the soul of friendship is a soft spirit seldom found except when two amiable creatures are knit from early youth, or when bound by mutual suffering and pursuits; it comes to some of the elect unsought and unaware; it descends as gentle dew on chosen spots which however barren they were before become under its benign influence fertile in all sweet plants; but when desired it flies; it scoffs at the prayers of its votaries; it will bestow, but not be sought.

I who had before clothed myself in the bright garb of sincerity must now borrow one of divers colours: it might sit awkwardly at first, but use would enable me to place it in elegant folds, to lie with grace.

I wandered for ever about these lovely solitudes, gathering flower after flower

I lived in a desolate country where there were none to praise and very few to love.

I feel death to be neart at hand and I am calm.

As I grew older books in some degree supplied the place of human intercourse:

I have learned the language of despair: I have it all by heart, for I am Despair;

At first, as the memory of former happiness contrasted to my present despair came across me,

Death is so dreadful to the living; the chains of habit are so strong even when affection does not link them that the heart must be agonized when they break.

It was all suffering; even my pleasures were endured, not enjoyed. I was as a solitary spot among mountains shut in on all sides by steep black precipices; where no ray of heat could penetrate; and from which there was no outlet to sunnier fields.

I would retire to the Continent and become a nun; not for a religion’s sake, for I was not a Catholic, but that I might for ever be shut out from the world.

I might find that which I most desired; dear to me if aught were dear, a death-like solitude.

My father had been and his memory was the life of my life.

If he dies with me it is well, and there will be an end of two miserable beings;

Yet he had one secret hidden from these dear friends; a secret he had nurtured from his earliest years, and although he loved his fellow collegiates he would not trust it to the delicacy or sympathy of any one among them. He loved.