These sensations were not precise, or definable. They were too complete
to be scanned; thought could not divide, nor reflection analyze them.
They did not take their rise in the loveliness of the superhuman
creature that I adored, for the shadow of death still lay between her
beauty and my eyes; or in the pride of being loved by her, for I knew
not if I was more in her sight than a dream of morning; or in the hope
of possessing her charms, for my respect was too far above such vile
gratifications of the senses even to stoop to them in thought; or in
the satisfaction of displaying my triumph, for selfish vanity held no
place in my heart, and I knew no one in that secluded spot before whom
I could profane my love by disclosing it; or in the hope of linking her
fate with mine, for I knew she was another's; or in the certainty of
seeing her, and the happiness of following her steps, for I was as
little free as she was, and in a few days fate was to divide us; nor,
lastly, in the certainty of being beloved, for I knew nothing of her
heart, except the one word and look of gratitude that she had addressed
to me.
Mine was another feeling; pure, calm, disinterested, and immaterial. It
was repose of the heart, after having met with the long sought-for, and
till then unfound, object of its restless adoration; the long-desired
idol of that vague, unquiet adoration of supreme beauty which agitates
the soul until the divinity has been discovered, and that our heart has
clung to as a straw to the magnet, or mingled with as sighs with the
surrounding air.
Strange to say, I felt no impatience to see her once more, to hear her
voice, to be near her, or to converse freely with one who had become
the sole object of my life and thoughts. I had seen her and she had
become part of myself. Henceforward nothing could rob my soul of its
possession; far or near, present or absent, I bore her with me; all
else was indifferent. Perfect love is patient, because it is absolute,
and knows itself to be eternal. No power could tear her from my heart.
I felt that henceforward her image was completely mine; it was to me
what light is to the eye that has once seen it, air to the lungs that
have once inhaled it, or thought to the mind in which it has once been
conceived. I defied Heaven itself to rob me of this divine embodying of
my desires. I had seen her, and that was enough. For the contemplative,
to see is to enjoy. It scarcely mattered to me whether she loved me, or
whether she passed me by without perceiving me. I had been touched by
her splendor, and was still enveloped in her rays; she could no more
withdraw them from me than the sun can take from the earth the beams
which he has shed upon it. I felt that darkness and night had fled
forever from my heart, and that she would evermore shine there, as she
then shone, though I lived for a thousand years.