I might be called inconsequent.  I was inconsequent, too, when I, a sceptic, had a mass offered up for Leon and Aniela, and prayed like a child, and swallowed my tears like any fool.  In future I will always be inconsequent when it suits me and makes me happier.  There is only one logic in the world,—­the logic of passions.  Reason holds the reins for a time, but when the horses tear along in mad career, she sits on the box and merely watches lest the vehicle should go to pieces.  The human heart cannot be rendered love-proof, and love is an element strong as tidal waves.  The very gates of hell cannot overcome a woman who loves her husband, for the marriage vows are only the sealing of love’s compact; but if it be mere duty, the first tide will throw her on the sands like a dead fish.  I cannot bind myself not to let my hair grow, or to remain always young; and as often as I did so, the laws of nature would take their course in spite of human bonds.  It is strange, but all that I am writing is pure theory.  I have no schemes I need justify before myself, and yet all these reflections have stirred my soul to such an extent that I had to leave off writing.  My calmness is evidently artificial.  I walked up and down the room for an hour, and at last found out what disturbed me.

It is very late.  From the windows of my room I see the cupola of the Invalides gleaming in the moonlight, as once I saw St. Peter’s cupola, when, full of hope, I walked on the Pincio, thinking of Aniela.  Unconsciously I had given myself up to those memories.  Whatever there be or awaits us in the future, one thing is certain:  I could have been happy, and she might be ten, nay, a hundred times happier than she is.  Even now, if I had any hidden schemes, or if she were to me the greatest temptation, I would respect her unhappiness.  I would not hurt her for anything.  The very thought of it would take away my courage and decision, I had such an amount of tenderness for her.

But all that is in the past.  The sceptic dwelling within me creeps up again with another question:  Would she be really so unhappy?  I have verified, not once, but several times, the fact that women are unhappy only while they struggle.  The battle once over, regardless of the result, there follows a period of calm and happiness.  I knew at one time a woman in Paris who resisted most persistently for three years.  When at last her heart got the upper hand and she gave in, she only reproached herself for not having done so sooner.

But what is the use of putting all these questions or trying to solve problems?  I know that every principle is open to argument, and every proof to scepticism.  The good old times when people doubted everything except their intelligence to recognize the true from the false, have gone.  At present there is nothing but labyrinths upon labyrinths.  I had better not think of anything but the journey before me.  And Kromitzki sold his wife’s ancestral home and thus inflicted on her a cruel blow!  I had to write it down black on white once more, otherwise I could not believe it.