Read Online The Human Comedy by Honoré de Balzac - Free Book Online
Authors: Honoré de Balzac
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“and, since we were in love, some of them were terrible indeed, and irreparable, I felt only contempt for myself, I felt vulgar, little by little I was drawing up a horrible code, the code of indulgence. When we seek vengeance for the sake of a woman, are we not acknowledging that there is only one woman for us, that we cannot do without her? And in that case, is vengeance the way to win her back? If one does not think her indispensable, if there are others, then why not allow her the same right to change that we claim for ourselves? This, let me be clear, applies only to extramarital passion; otherwise it would do harm to society, and nothing better proves the necessity of an unbreakable marriage bond than the instability of passion. The two sexes must be chained, like the fierce beasts they are, by unyielding laws, deaf and mute. Take away vengeance, and betrayal is of no import in love. Those who believe there is only one woman in all the world for them must choose vengeance, and in that case there is only one, Othello’s. Here is mine.”
These last words provoked in us all that slight stirring in our seats that journalists represent in parliamentary speeches with the word commotion .
“Cured of my cold and of absolute, pure, divine love, I inaugurated an adventure with a most charming heroine, her beauty of a sort perfectly counter to that of my fickle angel. I was careful not to break it off with that woman, that brilliant, unflappable actress, for I’m not sure that true love holds any pleasure so sweet as those afforded by faithlessness. Such duplicity is as good as virtue. I do not speak for you Englishwomen, milady.” This last comment the minister interjected sotto voce to Lady Barimore, Lord Dudley’s daughter. “In short, I tried to remain the same lover as before. My new angel required a keepsake fashioned from my locks. I thus called on a skilled artist who lived, at the time, on rue Boucher. This man had the monopoly on capillary souvenirs, and I provide his address for those who have little hair of their own: He has it in all colors and of every sort. Once he had heard me describe what I wished, he showed me his wares, among which I saw works of patience surpassing anything folktales attribute to fairies, any prisoner’s pastime. He told me of the caprices and fashions that governed the hair-worker’s trade. ‘For the past year,’ he said, ‘the rage has been to mark linens with a stitching of hair. Happily, I have a fine collection of hair and some excellent seamstresses.’ Suspicion takes hold of me on hearing these words. I pull out my handkerchief and say, ‘Then this was done in your establishment and with false hair?’ He looked at the handkerchief and said, ‘Oh! She was a most difficult customer, she insisted that the match with her own hair be perfect. My wife stitched those handkerchiefs herself. You have here, monsieur, one of the finest pieces ever produced.’ Before this last ray of light, I might still have believed in something, I might still have paid heed to a lady’s word. I left that place still believing in pleasure, but where love was concerned, I had become as atheistic as a mathematician. Two months later, I was sitting alongside that exquisite woman, in her boudoir, on her divan. I held one of her hands clasped in my own, and such lovely hands they were; we were scaling the Alps of emotion, picking the prettiest flowers, pulling the petals from daisies (one always ends up pulling the petals from daisies, even in a drawing room, without a daisy in sight). At the peak of tenderness, when one is most in love, love is so aware of its fleetingness that each lover feels an imperious need to ask, ‘Do you love me? Will you love me forever?’ I seized that elegiac moment, so warm, so florid, so radiant, to make her tell her most wonderful lies, in that glittering language of exquisite poetry and purple prose peculiar to love. Charlotte laid out all her prettiest
These last words provoked in us all that slight stirring in our seats that journalists represent in parliamentary speeches with the word commotion .
“Cured of my cold and of absolute, pure, divine love, I inaugurated an adventure with a most charming heroine, her beauty of a sort perfectly counter to that of my fickle angel. I was careful not to break it off with that woman, that brilliant, unflappable actress, for I’m not sure that true love holds any pleasure so sweet as those afforded by faithlessness. Such duplicity is as good as virtue. I do not speak for you Englishwomen, milady.” This last comment the minister interjected sotto voce to Lady Barimore, Lord Dudley’s daughter. “In short, I tried to remain the same lover as before. My new angel required a keepsake fashioned from my locks. I thus called on a skilled artist who lived, at the time, on rue Boucher. This man had the monopoly on capillary souvenirs, and I provide his address for those who have little hair of their own: He has it in all colors and of every sort. Once he had heard me describe what I wished, he showed me his wares, among which I saw works of patience surpassing anything folktales attribute to fairies, any prisoner’s pastime. He told me of the caprices and fashions that governed the hair-worker’s trade. ‘For the past year,’ he said, ‘the rage has been to mark linens with a stitching of hair. Happily, I have a fine collection of hair and some excellent seamstresses.’ Suspicion takes hold of me on hearing these words. I pull out my handkerchief and say, ‘Then this was done in your establishment and with false hair?’ He looked at the handkerchief and said, ‘Oh! She was a most difficult customer, she insisted that the match with her own hair be perfect. My wife stitched those handkerchiefs herself. You have here, monsieur, one of the finest pieces ever produced.’ Before this last ray of light, I might still have believed in something, I might still have paid heed to a lady’s word. I left that place still believing in pleasure, but where love was concerned, I had become as atheistic as a mathematician. Two months later, I was sitting alongside that exquisite woman, in her boudoir, on her divan. I held one of her hands clasped in my own, and such lovely hands they were; we were scaling the Alps of emotion, picking the prettiest flowers, pulling the petals from daisies (one always ends up pulling the petals from daisies, even in a drawing room, without a daisy in sight). At the peak of tenderness, when one is most in love, love is so aware of its fleetingness that each lover feels an imperious need to ask, ‘Do you love me? Will you love me forever?’ I seized that elegiac moment, so warm, so florid, so radiant, to make her tell her most wonderful lies, in that glittering language of exquisite poetry and purple prose peculiar to love. Charlotte laid out all her prettiest
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