His occupations and his thoughts are like impassive soldiers ranged in line of battle; a single shot strikes one down, his neighbors close the gap and the line is intact.
I had not that resource, since I was alone: nature, the kind mother, seemed, on the contrary, vaster and more empty than before.

Had I been able to forget my mistress, I should have been saved.

How many there are who can be cured with even less than that.

Such men are incapable of loving a faithless woman, and their conduct, under the circumstances, is admirable in its firmness.

But is it thus one loves at nineteen when, knowing nothing of the world, desiring everything, one feels, within, the germ of all the passions?
Everywhere some voice appeals to him.