 Chapter 8, Part 1, Book 1, of Confession of a Child of the Century. Yet I was not willing to yield, before taking life on its pleasant side, after having seen its evil side so dearly, I resolved to test everything. I remained thus for some time a prey to countless sorrows, tormented by terrible dreams. The great obstacle to my cure was my youth. However I happened to be, whatever my occupation, I could think of nothing but women. The sight of a woman made me tremble. I had been so fortunate as to give to love my virginity. But the result of this was that all my senses were united in the idea of love. There was the cause of my unhappiness, for not being able to think of anything but women, I could not help turning over in my head, day and night, all the ideas of debauchery, of false love and of feminine treason, with which my mind was filled. To possess a woman was for me to love her. For I thought of nothing but women, and I did not believe in the possibility of true love. All this suffering inspired me with a sort of rage, and at times I was tempted to imitate the monks and murder myself in order to conquer my senses. At times I felt like going out into the street, and throwing myself at the feet of the first woman I met, and vowing eternal love. God is my witness that I did all in my power to cure myself. Preoccupied from the first, with the idea that the society of men was the haunt of vice and hypocrisy, where all were like my mistress. I resolved to separate myself from them, and live in complete isolation. I resumed my neglected studies, I plunged into history, poetry and anatomy. There happened to be on the fourth floor of the same house, an old German who was well versed in law. I determined to learn his tongue. The German was poor and friendless, and willingly accepted the task of instructing me. My perpetual state of distraction worried him. How many times seated near him with a smoking lamp between us, he waited in patient astonishment, while I sat with my arms crossed on my book, lost in reverie, oblivious of his presence, and of his pity. My dear sir, said I to him one day, all this is useless, but you are the best of men. What a task you have undertaken. You must leave me to my fate. We can do nothing, neither you nor I. I do not know that he understood my meaning, but he grasped my hand, and there was no more talk of German. I soon realised that solitude, instead of curing me, was doing me harm, and so completely changed my system. I went to the country, and galloped through the woods with the huntsmen. I rode until I was out of breath. I tried to break myself with fatigue, and when, after a day of sweat in the fields, I reached my bed in the evening, smelling of powder and the stable, I buried my head in the pillow. I rolled about under the covers, and I cried, Phantom! Phantom! Are you not tired? Will you leave me for one night? But why these vain efforts? Solitude sent me to nature, and nature to love. When I stood in the street of observation, I saw myself surrounded by corpses, and drying my hands on my bloody apron, stifled by the odour of putrefaction, I turned my head in spite of myself, and I saw floating before my eyes green harvests, barmy fields, and the pensive harmony of the evening. No! I said, science cannot console me, I cannot plunge into dead nature. I would die there myself, and float about like a livid corpse, amidst the debris of shattered hopes. I would not cure myself of my youth. I will live where there is life, or I will at least die in the sun. I began to mingle with the throngs at Sèvres and Chavilles. I lay down in the midst of a flowery dale, in a secluded part of Chavilles. Alas! All these forests and prairies cried out to me. What do you seek here? We are green, poor child. We wear the colours of hope. Then I returned to the city. I lost myself in its obscure streets. I looked up at the lights in all its windows, all those mysterious family nests. I watched the passing carriages. I saw man jostling against man. Oh! What solitude! How sad the smoke on those roofs! What sorrow in those tortuous streets, where all are hurrying hither and thither, working and sweating, where thousands of strangers rub against your elbows! A cloaca, where there is only society of bodies, where souls are solitary and alone, where all who hold out a hand to you are prostitutes. Become corrupt, corrupt, and you will cease to suffer. This has been the cry of all cities to man. It is written with charcoal on city walls, on its streets with mud, on its faces with extraversated blood. And at times, when seated in the corner of some salon, I watched the women as they danced, some rosy, some blue, and others white, their arms bare, and hair clustered gracefully about their shapely heads, looking like cherubim, drunk with light, floating in their spheres of harmony and beauty. I would think, ah, what a garden! What flowers to gather, to breathe, ah, margarites, margarites! What will your last petal say to him who plucks it, a little, a little, but not all? That is the moral of the world. That is the end of your smiles. It is over this terrible abyss that you are walking in your flower-strewn gauze. It is on this hideous truth you run like gazelles on the tips of your little toes. But why take things so seriously, said Dejeuner? That is something that is never seen. You complain because bottles become empty. There are many casks in the vaults, and many vaults in the hills. Make me a good fish-hook, gilded with sweet words, with a drop of honey for bait. And quick, catch for me in the stream of oblivion, a pretty consola, as fresh and slippery as an eel. You will still have the hook when the fish shall have glided from your hands. Youth must pass away, and if I were you, I would carry off the Queen of Portugal, rather than study anatomy. Such was the advice of Dejeuner. I made my way home with swollen heart. My face concealed under my cloak. I kneeled at the side of my bed, and my poor heart dissolved in tears. What vows! What prayers! Galileo struck the earth, crying, Nevertheless, it moves! Thus I struck my heart. End of Chapter 8, Part 1, Book 1, Recording by Martin Giesen, in Hazelmere, Surrey. Chapter 9, Part 1, Book 1, Of Confession of a Child of the Century. This is a LibriWalk's recording. All LibriWalk's recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriWalks.org. Recording by Chessie, Confession of a Child of the Century by Alfred de Musée, translated by Kendall Warren. Book 1, Part 1, Chapter 9. Suddenly in the midst of greatest despair, youth and chance led me to commit an act that decided my fate. I had written my mistress saying that I never wished to see her again. I kept my word, but I passed the night under her window seated on a bench before her door. I could see the lights in her room. I could hear the sound of her piano. At times I saw something that looked like a shadow through the partially drawn curtains. The night as I was seated on the bench, plunged in frightful melancholy, I saw a belated workman staggering along the street. He muttered a few words in a dazed manner and then began to sing. He was so much under the influence of liquor that he walked at times on one side of the gutter and then on the other. Finally he fell on the bench facing another house opposite me. There he lay still, supported on his elbows and slept profoundly. The street was deserted. A dry wind swept the dust here and there. The moon shone through a rift in the clouds and lighted the spot where the man slept. So I found myself tethered with this man who, not suspecting my presence, was sleeping on that stone bench as peacefully as though in his own bed. Reserved to diverge my grief. I arose to leave him in full possession, then returned and resumed my seat. I could not leave that door at which I would not have knocked for an empire. Finally, after walking up and down for a few times, I stopped before the sleeper. What sleep, I said. Surely this man does not dream. His clothes are in tatters, his cheeks are wrinkled, his hands hardened with toil. He is some unfortunate who does not have bread every day. A thousand gnawing cares, a thousand mortal sorrows await his return to consciousness. For the last this evening he had a piece of money in his pocket. He entered a tavern where he purchased oblivion. He has earned enough in a week to enjoy a night of slumber, and he has perhaps purchased it at the expense of his children's supper. Now his mistress can betray him. His friend can glide like a thief into his hut. I could shake him by the shoulder and tell him that he is being murdered, that his house is on fire. He would turn over and continue to sleep. And I, I do not sleep, I continued pacing up and down the street. I do not sleep, I who have enough in my pocket at this moment to purchase sleep for a year. I am so proud and so foolish that I dare not enter a tavern. And I do not understand that if all unfortunates enter there, it is in order that they may come out happy. Oh, God! The juice of a grape crushed under the foot suffices to dissipate the deepest sorrow and to break only invisible threats that the fates weave about our pathway. We weep like women. We suffer like marchers. In our despair it seems that the world is crumbling under our feet, and we sit down in our tears as did Adam at Eden's gate. And in order to cure our wound, we have but to make a movement of the hand and moisten our throats. How pitiful our grief, since it can be thus asswaged. We are surprised that Providence does not send angels to grant our prayers. It need not take the trouble, for it has seen our woes. It knows our desires, our pride and bitterness, the ocean of evil that surrounds us, and is content to hang a small black fruit along our paths. Since that man sleeps so soundly on his bench, why do not I sleep on mine? Our rival is doubtless passing the night with my mistress. He will leave her at daybreak. She will accompany him to the door, and they will see me asleep on my bench. Their kisses will not awaken me, and they will shake me by the shoulder. I will turn over on the other side and sleep on, thus inspired by a fierce joy I set out in quest of a tavern. As it was past midnight, some were closed. That put me in a fury. What! I cried. Even that consolation is refused me. I ran hither and thither, knocking at the doors of taverns, crying, Wine! Wine! At last I found one open. I called for a bottle, and without caring whether it was good or bad, I gulped it down. A second followed, and then a third. I dosed myself as with medicine, and I forced the wine down as though it had been prescribed by a physician to save my life. The heavy fumes of the liquor which was doubtless adulterated mounted to my head. As I had gulped it down at the breath, drunkenness seized me promptly. I felt that I was becoming muddled. Then I experienced a lucid moment, then confusion followed. Then consciousness left me. I lanced my elbows on the table, and said adieu to myself. But I had a confused idea that I was not alone in the tavern. At the other end of the room stood a hideous group with haggard faces and harsh voices. Their dress indicated that they belonged to the poorer class, but were not bourgeois. In short they belonged to that ambiguous class, the wildest of all, which has neither fortune nor occupation, which never works except at some criminal plot, which is neither poor nor rich, and combines the wisest of one class with the misery of the other. They were disputing over a dirty pack of cards. Among them I saw a girl who appeared to be very young and very pretty, decently clad, and resembling her companions in no way except in the harshness of her voice, which was rough and broken as though it had performed the office of public cryer. She looked at me closely as though astonished to see me in such a place, for I was elegantly attired. Little by little she approached my table, and seeing that all the bottles were empty, smiled. I saw that she had fine teeth of brilliant whiteness. I took her hand and begged her to be seated. She consented with good grace and asked what we should have for supper. I looked at her without saying a word, while my eyes began to fill with tears. She observed my emotion and inquired the cause. I could not reply. She understood that I had some secret sorrow and forbore any attempt to learn a cause. Drawing her handkerchief she dried my tears from time to time as we dined. There was something about that girl that was at once repulsive and sweet. A singular impudence mingled with pity that I could not understand. If she had taken my hand in the street she would have inspired a feeling of horror in me. But it seemed so strange that a creature I had never seen should come to me, and without a word proceed to order supper and dry my tears with her handkerchief that I was rendered speechless, revolted and yet charmed. What I had done had been done so quickly that I seemed to have obeyed some impulse of despair. Perhaps I was a fool or the victim of some supernal caprice. Who are you? I suddenly cried out. What do you want of me? How do you know who I am? Who told you to dry my tears? Is this your vocation and do you think I desire you? I would not touch you with the tip of my finger. What are you doing here? Reply at once. Is it money you want? What price do you put on your pity? I arose and tried to go out, but my feet refused to support me. At the same time my eyes failed me. A mortal weakness took possession of me and I fell over a chair. You are not well, she said, taking me by the arm. You have drunk, like the child that you are, without knowing what you were doing. Sit down in this chair and wait until a cap passes. You will tell me where you live and I will order the driver to take you home to your mother, since, she added, you really find me ugly. As she spoke I raised my eyes. Perhaps my drunkenness deceived me, or perhaps I had not seen her face clearly before. But suddenly I detected in that unfortunate a fatal resemblance to my mistress. I shuddered at the sight. There is a certain shudder that affects the hair. Some say it is death passing over the head, but it was not death that passed over mine. It was the melody of the age, or rather that girl was it herself, and it was she who, with her pale half-mocking features, came and seated herself before me near the door of the tavern. CHAPTER 9 PART 1, BOOK 1 CHAPTER 10 PART 1, BOOK 1, OF CONFESSION OF A CHILD OF THE CENTURY. This is a LibriVox recording, or LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Martin Giesen. CONFESSION OF A CHILD OF THE CENTURY by Alfred de Musée Translated by Kendall Warren. BOOK 1, PART 1 CHAPTER 10 The instant I noticed her resemblance to my mistress, a frightful idea occurred to me. It took irresistible possession of my muddled mind, and I put it into execution at once. I took that girl home with me. I arranged my run just as I was accustomed to do when my mistress was with me. I was dominated by a certain recollection of past joys. Having arranged my run to my satisfaction, I gave myself up to the intoxication of despair. I probed my heart to the bottom in order to sound its depths. A Tyrolian song that my mistress used to sing began to run through my head. Altra volta geribiele, blanche rossa, ca un flore. Marano, non son più belle, consumatis dall'amore. Once I was beautiful, white and rosy as a flower, but now I am not. I am no longer beautiful, consumed by the fire of love. I listened to the echo of that song as it reverberated through my heart. I said, behold the happiness of man, behold my little paradise, behold my Queen Mab, a girl from the streets. My mistress is no better. Behold what is found at the bottom of the glass when the nectar of the gods has been drained. Behold the corpse of love. The unfortunate creature heard me singing and began to sing herself. I turned pale for that harsh and rasping voice coming from the lips of one who resembled my mistress seems to be a symbol of my experience. It sounded like a gurgle in the throat of debauchery. It seemed to me that my mistress, having been unfaithful, must have such a voice. I was reminded of Faust, who dancing at Plochen with a young sorceress, saw a red mouse come from her throat. Stop! I cried. I arose and approached her. Let me ask you, O you men of the time, who are bent upon pleasure, who attend the balls and the opera, and who upon retiring this night will seek slumber with the aid of some threadbare blasphemy of old Voltaire, some sensible badinage of Paul-Louis Courier, some essay on economics, you who dally with the cold substance of that monstrous water lily that reason has planted in the hearts of our cities. I beg of you, if by some chance this obscure book falls into your hands, do not smile with noble disdain. Do not shrug your shoulders. Do not be too sure that I complain of an imaginary evil. Do not be too sure that human reason is the most beautiful of faculties, that there is nothing real here below, but quotations on the bourse, gambling in the salon, wine on the table, a healthy body, indifference toward others, and the orgies which come with the night. For some day, across your stagnant life, a gust of wind will blow. Those beautiful trees that you water with the stream of oblivion, providence will destroy. You will be reduced to despair. Miser the impassive, there will be tears in your eyes. I will not say that your mistresses will deceive you. That would not grieve you so much as the loss of your horse. But I do tell you that you will lose on the bourse, your moneyed tranquility, your golden happiness, or in the care of a banker who may fail. In short, I tell you, all frozen as you are, you are capable of loving something. Some fibre of your being will be torn, and you will give vent to a cry that will resemble a moan of pain. Some day, wandering about the muddy streets, when daily material joys shall have failed, you will find yourself seated, disconsolently, on a deserted bench at midnight. O men of marble, sublime egoists, inimitable reasoners, who have never given way to despair or made a mistake in arithmetic. If this ever happens to you, at the hour of your ruin, you will remember Abelard when he lost Eloise. For he loved her more than you love your horses, your money or your mistresses. For he lost in losing her more than your Prince Satan would lose in falling again from the battlements of heaven. For he loved her with a certain love of which the gazettes do not speak, the shadow of which your wives and your daughters do not perceive in our theatres and in our books. For he passed half of his life kissing her white forehead, teaching her to sing the psalms of David and the canticles of Saul. For he did not love her on earth alone, and God consoled him. Believe me, when in your distress you think of Abelard, you will not look with the same eye upon the sweet blasphemy of Voltaire and the badinage of Courier. You will feel that the human reason can cure illusions, but not sorrows, that God has use for reason, but he has not made her the sister of charity. You will find that when the heart of man said, I believe in nothing, for I see nothing, it did not speak the last word on the subject. You will look about you for something like hope. You will shake the doors of churches to see if they still swing, but you will find them walled up. You will think of becoming trappists, and destiny will mock at you and, for reply, give you a bottle of wine and a courtesan. And if you drink the wine, if you take the courtesan, you will have learned how such things come about. End of chapter 10 part 1, Book 1 Recording by Martin Geeson in Hazelmere Surrey. Chapter 1 part 2, Book 1 of Confession of a Child of the Century. This is a LibriVox recording, or LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Martin Geeson. Confession of a Child of the Century by Alfred de Muset. Translated by Kendall Warren. Book 1 part 2, Chapter 1 Awakening the next morning, I experienced a feeling of such deep disgust with myself. I felt so degraded in my own eyes that a horrible temptation assailed me. I leapt from bed and ordered the creature to leave my room as quickly as possible. Then I sat down and looked gloomily about the room, my eyes resting mechanically on a brace of pistols that decorated the walls. When the suffering mind advances its hands, so to speak, towards annihilation, when our soul forms a violent resolution, there seems to be an independent physical horror in the act of touching the cold steel of some deadly weapon. The fingers stiffen in anguish. The arm grows cold and hard. Nature recoils as the condemned walks to death. I cannot express what I experienced while waiting for that girl to go, unless it was as though my pistol had said to me, Think what you are about to do. Since then I have often wondered what would have happened to me if the girl had departed immediately. Doubtless the first flush of shame would have subsided. Sadness is not despair, and God has joined them in order that one should not leave us alone with the other. Once relieved of the presence of that woman, my heart would have become calm. There would remain only repentance, for the angel of pardon has forbidden man to kill. But I was doubtless cured for life. Debortury was once for all driven from my door, and I would never again know the feeling of disgust with which its first visit had inspired me. But it happened otherwise. The struggle which was going on within, the poignant reflections which overwhelmed me, the disgust, the fear, the wrath even. For I experienced all these emotions at the same time. All these fatal powers nailed me to my chair, and while I was thus a prey to the most dangerous delirium, the creature standing before my mirror thought of nothing but how best to arrange her dress and fix her hair, smiling the while. This lasted more than a quarter of an hour, during which I had almost forgotten her. Finally some slight noise attracted my attention to her, and turning about with impatience I ordered her to leave the room in such a tone that she at once opened the door and threw me a kiss before going out. At the same moment someone rang the bell of the outer door. I arose hastily, and had only time to open the closet door and motion the creature into it, when Dejeuner entered the room with two friends. The great currents that are found in the middle of the ocean resemble certain events in life. Fatality, chance, providence. What matters the name? Those who quarrel over the word admit the fact. Such are not those who, speaking of Napoleon or Caesar, say, he was a man of providence. They apparently believe that heroes merit the attention which heaven shows them, and that the colour of purple attracts gods as well as bulls. What decides the course of these little events? What objects and circumstances, in appearance, the least important, lead to changes in fortune? There is not, to my mind, a deeper abyss for the thought. There is something in our ordinary actions that resembles the little blunted arrows we shoot at targets. Little by little we make of our successive results an abstract and regular entity that we call our prudence or our will. Then a gust of wind passes, and behold the smallest of these arrows, the very lightest and most futile, is carried beyond our vision, beyond the horizon to the dwelling place of God himself. What a strange feeling of unrest seizes us then. What becomes of those phantoms of tranquil pride? The will and prudence. Force itself that mistress of the world, that sword of man in the combat of life. In vain do we brandish it over our heads in wrath. In vain do we seek to ward off with it a blow which threatens us. An invisible power turns aside the point, and all the impetus of our effort, deflected into space, serves only to precipitate our fall. Thus at the moment I was hoping to cleanse myself from the sin I had committed, perhaps to inflict the penalty. At the very instant when a great horror had taken possession of me, I learned that I had to sustain a dangerous intervention. Dejeuner was in good humour. Stretching out on my sofa, he began to chaff me about the appearance of my face, which looked, he said, as though I had not slept well. As I was little disposed to indulge in pleasantry, I begged him to spare me. He appeared to pay no attention to me, but warned by my tone, he soon broached the subject that had brought him to me. He informed me that my mistress had not only two lovers at a time, but three. That is to say, she had treated my rival as badly as she had treated me. The poor boy, having discovered her inconstancy, made a greater do, and all Paris knew it. At first I did not catch the meaning of Dejeuner's words, as I was not listening attentively. But when he had repeated his story three times in detail, I was so stupefied that I could not reply. My first impulse was to laugh, for I saw that I had loved the most unworthy of women, but it was no less true that I loved her still. Is it possible? was all I could say. Dejeuner's friends confirmed all he had said. My mistress had been surprised in her own house between two lovers, and a scene that all Paris knew by heart ensued. She was disgraced, obliged to leave Paris, or remain exposed to the most bitter taunts. It was easy for me to see that in all the ridicule expended on the subject of this woman, on my unreasonable passion for her, was premeditated. To say that she deserved severest censure, that she had perhaps committed worse sins than those with which she was charged, that was to make me feel that I had been merely one of her dupes. All that did not please me. But Dejeuner had undertaken the task of curing me of my love, and was prepared to treat my disease heroically. A long friendship founded on mutual services gave him rights, and as his motive appeared praiseworthy, I allowed him to have his way. Not only did he not spare me, but when he saw my trouble and my shame increase, he pressed me the harder. My impatience was so obvious that he could not continue. So he stopped and remained silent, a course that irritated me still more. In my turn I began to ask questions. I paced to and fro in my room. Although the recital of that story was insupportable, I wanted to hear it again. I tried to assume a smiling face and tranquil air, but in vain. Dejeuner suddenly became silent after having shown himself to be a most virulent gossip. While I was pacing up and down my room, he looked at me calmly, as though I was a caged fox. I cannot express my feeling. A woman who had so long been the idol of my heart, and who, since I had lost her, had caused me such deep affliction. The only one I had ever loved, she for whom I would weep till death, become suddenly a shameless wretch. The subject of course jests, of universal censure and scandal. It seemed to me that I felt on my shoulder the impression of a heated iron, and that I was marked with a burning stigma. The more I reflected, the more the darkness thickened about me. From time to time I turned my head, and saw a cold smile or a curious glance. Dejeuner did not leave me. He knew very well what he was doing. He knew that I might go to any length in my present desperate condition. When he found that he had brought me to the desired point, he did not hesitate to deal the finishing stroke. Does that story displease you? he asked. The best is yet to come. My dear Octav, the scene I have described took place on a certain night when the moon was shining brightly. While the two lovers were quarrelling over their fair one, and talking of cutting her throat, as she sat before the fire, down in the street a certain shadow was seen to pass up and down before the house. A shadow that resembled you so closely, that it was decided that it must be you. Who says that? I asked. Who has seen me in the street? Your mistress herself. She has told everyone about it, who cared to listen, just as cheerfully as we tell you her story. She claims that you love her still, that you keep guard at her door. In short, everything you can think of. But you should know that she talks about you publicly. I have never been able to lie, for whenever I have tried to disguise the truth my face betrayed me. Amour Pop, the shame of confessing my weakness before witnesses, induced me, however, to make the effort. It is very true that I was in the street, I thought, but if I had known that my mistress was as bad as she was, I would not have been there. Finally I persuaded myself that I had not been seen distinctly. I attempted to deny it. A deep blush suffused my face, and I felt the futility of my faint. Digenet smiled. Take care, said he. Take care. Do not go too far. But I protested. How did I know it? How could I know? Digenet compressed his lips, as though to say you knew enough. I stopped short, mumbling the remnant of my sentence. My blood became so hot that I could not continue. I, in the street, bathed in tears, in despair, and during that time, that encounter within, what, that very night, mocked by her. Surely Digenet you are dreaming. Is it true? Can it be possible? What do you know about it? Thus talking at random, I lost my head, and an irresistible feeling of wrath began to rise within me. Finally I sat down, exhausted. My friend, said Digenet, do not take the thing so seriously. The solitary life you have been leading for the last two months has made you ill. I see you have need of distraction. Come to supper with me this evening, and tomorrow morning we will go to the country. The tone in which he said this hurt me more than anything else. In vain I tried to control myself. Yes, I thought, deceived by that woman, poisoned by horrible suggestions, having no refuge either in work or in fatigue, having for my only safeguard against despair and ruin a sacred but frightful grief. Oh God, is it that grief, that sacred relic of my sorrow that has just crumbled in my hands. It is no longer my love, it is my despair that is insulted. Mockery, she mocks at me as I weep. That appeared incredible to me. All the memories of the past clustered about my heart when I thought of it. I seemed to see, one after the other, the spectres of our nights of love. They hung over a bottomless eternal abyss, black as chaos, and from the bottom of that abyss they burst forth a shriek of laughter. Sweet but mocking, that said, Behold your reward! If I had been told that the world mocked at me, I would have replied so much the worse for it, and I would not be angry. But at the same time I was told that my mistress was a shameless wretch. Thus on one side the ridicule was public, vouched for, stated by two witnesses, who before telling what they knew must have felt that the world was against me. And on the other hand, what reply could I make? How could I escape? What could I do when the centre of my life, my heart itself, was ruined, killed, annihilated? What could I say when that woman for whom I had braved all? Ridicule as well as blame, for whom I had borne a mountain of misery, when that woman whom I loved and who loved another, of whom I demanded no love, of whom I desired nothing but permission to weep at her door. No favour but that of vowing my youth to her memory and writing her name, her name alone on the tomb of my hopes. Ah, when I thought of it, I felt the hand of death heavy upon me. That woman mocked me. It was she who first pointed her finger at me, singling me out to the idle crowd which surrounded her. It was she, it was those lips, so many times pressed to mine. It was that body, that soul of my life, my flesh and my blood. It was from that source the injury came. Yes, the last of all, the most cowardly and the most bitter, the pitiless laugh that spits in the face of grief. The more I thought of it, the more enraged I became. Did I say enraged? I do not know what passion controlled me. What I do know is that an inordinate desire for vengeance took possession of me. How could I revenge myself on a woman? I would have paid any price for a weapon that could be used against her, but I had none. Not even the one she had employed, I could not pay her in her own coin. Suddenly I noticed a shadow moving behind the curtain before the closet. I had forgotten her. Listen to me, I cried rising. I have loved, I have loved like a fool. I deserve all the ridicule you have subjected me to, but by heaven I will show you something that will prove to you that I am not such a fool as you think. With these words I pulled aside the curtain and exposed the interior of the closet. The girl was trying to conceal herself in a corner. Go in, if you choose, I said to Dejeuner. You who call me a fool for loving a woman, see how your teaching has affected me. Do you think I passed last night under the windows of— But that is not all, I added. That is not all I have to say. You give a supper to-night, and to-morrow go to the country. I am with you, and shall not leave you from now on. We shall not separate, but pass the entire day together. Are you with me? Agreed. I have tried to make of my heart the mausoleum of my love, but I will bury my love in another tomb. With these words I sat down, marveling how indignation can solace grief and restore happiness. Whoever is astonished to learn that from that day I completely changed my course of life does not know the heart of man, and he does not understand that a young man of twenty may hesitate before taking a step, but does not retreat when he has once taken it. End of Chapter 1, Part 2, Book 1. Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmere, Surrey. Chapter 2, Part 2, Book 1. Of confession of a child of the century. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Martin Giesen. Confession of a Child of the Century by Alfred de Musée. Translated by Kendall Warren. Book 1, Part 2, Chapter 2. The apprenticeship to debauchery resembles vertigo, for one feels at first a sort of terror mingled with sensuous delight, as though peering down from some dizzy height. While shameful secret dissipation ruins the noblest of men, in frank and open irregularities, there is some palliation, even for the most depraved. He who goes out at nightfall, muffled in his cloak, to sully his life incognito, and to clandestinely shake off the hypocrisy of the day, resembles an Italian who strikes his enemy from behind, not daring to provoke him to open quarrel. There are assassinations in the dark corners of the city, under shelter of the night. He who goes his way without concealment says, Everyone does it and conceals it, I do it and do not conceal it. Thus speaks pride, and once that cuirass has been buckled on, it glitters with the refulgent light of day. It is said that Damocles saw a sword suspended over his head. Thus Libertines seem to have something over their heads, which says, Go on, but I hold the thread. Those masked carriages that are seen during carnival are the faithful images of their life. A dilapidated open wagon, flaming torches lighting up painted faces, such laugh and sing. Among them you see what appears to be women. They are in fact the remains of women with human semblance. They are caressed and insulted. No one knows who they are or what their names. All that floats and staggers under the flaming torch, in an intoxication that thinks of nothing, and over which it is said a God watches. But if the first impression is astonishment, the second is horror, and the third pity. There is displayed there so much force, or rather such an abuse of force, that it often happens that the noblest characters and the strongest constitutions are ruined. It appears hardy and dangerous to these. They would make prodigies of themselves. They bind themselves to debauchery, as did Matzebba to his horse. They gallop. They make centaurs of themselves. And they see neither the bloody trail that the shreds of their flesh leave, nor the eyes of the wolves that gleam in hungry pursuit, nor the desert, nor the vultures. Launched into that life by the circumstances that I have recounted, I must now describe what I saw there. The first time I had a close view of one of those famous gatherings called theatrical masked balls. I heard the debauchery of the Regency spoken of, and the time when a Queen of France was disguised as a flower merchant. I found their flower merchants disguised as camp followers. I expected to find Libertinism there, but in fact I found none at all. It is only the scum of Libertinism. Some blows and drunken women lying in death-like stupor on broken bottles. The first time I saw debauchery at table, I heard of the suppers of Heliogabalus and of the philosophy of Greece which made the pleasure of the senses a kind of religion of nature. I expected to find oblivion, or something like joy. I found there the worst thing in the world, ennui, trying to live. And an Englishman who said, I do this or that, therefore I amuse myself. I have spent so many pieces of gold, therefore I experience so much pleasure. And they wear out their life on that grindstone. The first time I saw courtesans, I heard of a spasier who sat on the knees of Alcibiades while discussing philosophy with Socrates. I expected to find something bold and insolent, but gay, free and vivacious, something of the sparkle of champagne. I found a yawning mouth, a fixed eye and hooked hands. The first time I saw titled courtesans, I read Boccaccio and Andalus, tasting of everything I read Shakespeare. I had dreamed of those beautiful triflers, of those cherubim of hell. A thousand times I had drawn those heads so poetically foolish, so enterprising in audacity, heads of harebrained mistresses who spoil a romance with a glance, and who walk through life by waves and by shocks, like the undulating sirens. I thought of the fairies of the modern tales who are always drunk with love, if not with wine. I found instead writers of letters, arrangers of precise hours, who practice lying as an art, and cloak their baseness under hypocrisy, whose only thought is to give themselves and forget. The first time I looked on the gaming table, I heard of floods of gold, of fortunes made in the quarter of an hour, and of a lord of the court of Henry IV, who won on one card a hundred thousand louis. I found a narrow room where workmen who had but one shirt rented a suit for the evening for twenty sews, police stationed at the door, and starving wretches staking a crust of bread against a pistol shot. The first time I saw an assembly, public or other, open to one of those thirty thousand women who are permitted to sell themselves in Paris, I heard of the Saturnalia of all times, of every imaginable orgy, from Babylon to Rome, from the Temple of Priapus to the Parque-Ossère, and I have always seen written on the sill of that door the word pleasure. I found nothing suggestive of pleasure, but in its place the word prostitution, and it has always appeared ineffacable, not graven in that metal that takes the sun's light, but in the pay list of all that of the cold light whose colours seem tinted by the somber hues of night. Silver The first time I saw the people, it was a frightful morning of Ash Wednesday, near Courty. A cold fine rain had been falling since the evening before. The streets were covered with pools of water. Masked carriages filed hither and thither, crowding between hedges of hideous men and women standing on the sidewalks. That sinister wall of spectators had tiger eyes, red with wine, gleaming with hatred. The carriage-wheels splashed mud over this wall, but it did not move. The night was standing on the front seat of an open carriage. From time to time a man in rags would step out from the wall, hurl a torrent of abuse at us, then cover us with a cloud of flower. Mud would soon follow, yet we kept on our way toward the Isle of Love and the pretty wood of Romaville. Consecrated by so many sweet kisses, one of my friends fell from his seat into the mud, narrowly escaping death on the paving. The people threw themselves on him to overpower him, and we were obliged to hasten to his assistance. One of the trumpeters who preceded us on horseback was struck on the shoulder by a paving-stone. The flower had given out. I had never heard of anything like that. I began to understand the time and comprehend the spirit of the age. Chapter 3 Part 2 Book 1 of Confession of a Child of the Century This is a LibriVox recording, all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Martin Giesen Confession of a Child of the Century by Alfred de Musée Translated by Kendall Warren Book 1 Part 2 Chapter 3 Dejeuner had planned a reunion of young people at his country house. The best wines, a splendid table, gaming, dancing, hunting, nothing was lacking. Dejeuner was rich and generous. He combined antique hospitality with modern custom. Moreover, one could always find in his house the best books. His conversation was that of a man of learning and culture. He was a problem. I took with me a taciturn humour that nothing could overcome. He respected it scrupulously. I did not reply to his questions and he dropped the subject. He was satisfied that I had forgotten my mistress. Nevertheless, I went to the chase and appeared at the table and was as convivial as the best. He asked no more. One of the most unfortunate proclivities of inexperienced youth is to judge of the world from first impressions. But it must be confessed that there is a race of men who are unfortunate. It is that race which says to youth, you are right in believing in evil and we know what it is. I have heard, for example, a curious thing spoken of, a medium between good and evil, a certain arrangement between heartless women and men worthy of them. They call love the passing sentiment. They speak of it as of an engine constructed by a wagon-builder or a building-contractor. They said to me, this and that are agreed upon. Such and such phrases are spoken and certain others are repeated in reply. Letters are written in a prescribed manner. The knees are adjusted in a certain attitude. All that was regulated as a parade. These fine fellows had grey hair. That made me laugh. Unfortunately for me, I cannot tell a woman I despise that I love her, even when I know that it is only a convention and that she will not be deceived by it. I have never bent my knee to the ground when my heart did not go with it, so that class of women known as easy is unknown to me, or if I allow myself to be taken with them, it is without knowing it and through simplicity. I can understand that one's soul can be put aside, but not that it should be handled. That there is some pride in this I confess, but I do not intend either to boast or to lower myself. Above all things, I hate those women who laugh at love and I permit them to reciprocate the sentiment. There will never be any dispute between us. Such women are beneath the courtesans, for courtesans may lie as well as they, but courtesans are capable of love and those women are not. I remember a woman who loved me and who said to a man many times richer than I, with whom she was living, I am weary of you, I am going to my lover. That woman is worth more than many others who are not despised by society. I passed the entire season with Dejeuner and learned that my mistress had left France. That news left in my heart a feeling of languor which I could not overcome. At the sight of that world which surrounded me, so new to me, I experienced at first a kind of bizarre curiosity at once sad and profound that caused me to look at things as does a restless horse. An incident occurred which made a deep impression on me. Dejeuner had with him a very beautiful mistress who loved him much. One evening as I was walking with him I told him that I considered her such as she was that is to say admirable, as much on account of her attachment for him as because of her beauty. In short I praised her highly and with warmth giving him to understand that he ought to be happy. He made no reply. It was his manner for he was the driest of men. That night when all had retired and I had been in bed some fifteen minutes I heard a knock at my door. I supposed it was some one of my friends who could not sleep and invited him to enter. There appeared before my astonished eyes a woman very pale carrying a bouquet in her hands to which was attached a piece of paper bearing these words to Octave from his friend Dejeuner. I had no sooner read these words when a flash of light came to me. I understood the meaning of this action of Dejeuner in making me this Turk's gift. It was intended for a lesson in love. That woman loved him. I had praised her and he wished to tell me that I ought not to love her whether I refused her or accepted her. That made me think. The poor woman was weeping and did not dare dry her tears for fear I would see them. What threat had he used to make her come? I did not know. I said to her you may return and fear nothing. She replied that if she should return Dejeuner would send her back to Paris. Yes, I replied you are beautiful and I am susceptible to temptation but you weep and your tears are not being shed for me. I care nothing for the rest. Go therefore and I will see to it that you are not sent back to Paris. One of my peculiarities is that meditation which with the great number is a firm and constant quality of the mind is in my case an instinct independent of the will and it ceases me like an access of passion. It comes to me at intervals in its own good time in spite of me and in almost any place but when it comes I can do nothing against it it takes me whither it pleases by whatever route seems good to it. When the woman had left I sat up my friend I said to myself behold what has been sent to you if Dejeuner had not seen fit to send you his mistress he would not have been mistaken perhaps for supposing you might fall in love with her. Have you well considered it a sublime and divine mystery is accomplished such a being costs nature the most vigilant maternal care yet a man who would cure you can think of nothing better than to offer you lips which belong to him in order to teach you to cease to love. How is it accomplished? Others than you have doubtless admired her but they ran no risk she might employ all the seduction she pleased you alone were in danger it must be that Dejeuner has a heart since he lives in what respect does he differ from you he is a man who believes in nothing fears nothing who knows no care or ennui perhaps and yet it is clear that a scratch on the finger would fill him with terror for if his body abandons him what becomes of him he lives only in the body what sort of creature is that who treats his soul as the flagellants treat their bodies can one live without a head think of it here is a man who possesses the most beautiful woman in the world he is young and ardent he finds her beautiful and tells her so she replies that she loves him someone touches him on the shoulder and says to him she is unfaithful nothing more he is sure of himself if someone had said she is a poisoner he would perhaps have continued to love her he would not have given her a kiss less but she is unfaithful and it is no more a question of love with him than of the star of Saturn what is there in that word a word that is merited, positive, withering it is agreed but why? it is still but a word can you kill a body with a word and if you love that body someone pours a glass of wine and says to you do not love that for you can get four for six francs and if you become intoxicated but that Dejeuner loves his mistress since he keeps her he must therefore have a peculiar fashion of loving no, he has not his fashion of loving is not love and he cares no more for the woman who merits affection and for her who is unworthy he loves no one simply and truly what has led him to that? was he born thus? to love is as natural as to eat and to drink he is not a man is he a dwarf or a giant? but always that impassive body upon what does he feed? what brew does he drink? behold him at thirty as old as the senile Mithridates the poisons of vipers are his familiar friends there is the great secret my child the key to which you must seize by whatever process of reasoning debauchery may be defended it will be proven that it is natural at a given day, hour or evening but not tomorrow nor every day there is not a people on earth which has not considered woman either the companion and consolation of man or the sacred instrument of life and has not under these two forms honoured her and yet here is an armed warrior who leaps into the abyss that God has dug with his own hands between man and brute as well might he deny the fact what mute titan is this who dares repress under the kisses of the body the love of the thought and place on human lips the stigma of the brute the seal of eternal silence there is a word that should be studied there breathes under the wind of those dismal forests that are called secrets of the body one of those mysteries that the angels of destruction whisper in the ear of night as it descends upon the earth that man is better or worse than God has made him his bowels are like those of sterile women where nature has not completed her work or there is distilled in the shadow some venomous poison ah yes, neither occupation nor study have been able to cure you my friend to forget and to learn that is your device you finger the leaves of dead books you are too young for ruins look about you the pale herd of men surrounds you the eyes of the sphinx glitter in the midst of divine hieroglyphics decipher the book of life courage scholar launch out on the sticks the invulnerable flood and let the waves of sorrow waft you to death or to God End of Chapter 3 Part 2, Book 1 Recording by Martin Geeson in Hazelmere Surrey