What an inadequate, mean standard is human intellect when it comes to
measure anything great, awesome, or very lofty. Reason, which serves
well enough in the everyday conditions of life, becomes a drivelling
fool, like Polonius, in exceptional cases. It seems to me that the
usual ethical code cannot be considered a standard by which to measure
great passions. To see in an immense feeling like mine only the
infringement of this or that law, not to see anything else, not to see
that it is an element and part of those higher forces that mock at
empty rules, a godlike, immeasurable, creative power on which rests
the All-Life, is a kind of blindness and littleness. Alas, Aniela thus
looks upon my love! I suppose she often thinks I must respect her for
her conduct; while I--God knows, I do not say it because it concerns
my own fate, but judging her quite impartially--despise her, or at
least try not to despise her for it, and say to her inwardly: "I
should respect you and worship you a thousandfold if you could look
upon the matter differently, not as regards our relations, but as
regards love in general."