Confessions of Zeno quotes

See my childhood? Now that I am separated from it by over fifty years, my presbyopic eyes might perhaps reach to it if the light were not obscured by so many obstacles.

The years like impassable mountains rise between me and it, my past years and a few brief hours in my life.

The doctor advised me not to insist too much on looking so far back. Recent events, he says, are equally valuable for him, and above all my fancies and dreams of the night before.

I seize my pencil in order to remind them that it is the duty of thought to manifest itself. At once the wrinkles collect on my brow, thinking of the letters which make up every word.

The present surges up and dominates me, the past is blotted out.

Yesterday I tried to let myself go completely. The result was that I fell into a deep sleep and experienced nothing except a great sense of refreshment, and the curious sensation of having seen something important while I was asleep.

I think I can write about smoking here, at my table without sitting down to dream in that arm-chair. I don’t know how to begin.

I must invoke the aid of all those many cigarettes I have smoked, identical with the one I have in my hand now.

I have just made a discovery. I had quite forgotten that the first cigarettes I ever smoked are no longer on the market. They were made first in 1870 in Austria and were sold in little cardboard boxes stamped with the double-headed eagle.

All this was lying dormant in my mind and so close at hand. It had never come to life before, because it is only now that I realise its possible significance.

So now I have traced my bad habit back to the very beginning and (who knows?) I may be cured already.

I will light one last cigarette, just to try, and probably I shall throw it away in disgust.

The very fact of hiding them sent a kind of shudder through me, for I knew how sick they would make me. Then I would smoke them till cold drops of perspiration stood on my forehead and I felt horribly bad inside.

No one could say that as a child I lacked determination.

I remember perfectly how my father cured me of that habit too. I had come back one summer’s day from a school excursion, tired and very hot.

Her smile made such a deep impression on me that I immediately recognised it when I saw it one day long afterwards on my wife’s lips.

Later on, lack of money was no obstacle to my satisfying my craving, but any prohibition sufficed to excite it.

I smoked continually, hidden in all sorts of secret places. I particularly remember one half-hour spent in a dark cellar, because I was so terribly unwell afterwards.

But at that time I didn’t know whether I liked or hated the taste of cigarettes and the condition produced by nicotine.

When I discovered that I really hated it all, it was much worse.

That was when I was about twenty. For several weeks I suffered from a violent sore throat accompanied by fever. The doctor ordered me to stay in bed and to give up smoking entirely.

This illness was the direct cause of my second trouble: the trouble I took trying to rid myself of the first.

My days became filled with cigarettes and resolutions to give up smoking, and, to make a clean sweep of it, that is more or less what they are still.

The dance of the last cigarette which began when I was twenty has not reached its last figure yet. My resolutions are less drastic and, as I grow older, I become more indulgent to my weaknesses.

the trouble I took trying to rid myself of the first. My days became filled with cigarettes and resolutions to give up smoking, and, to make a clean sweep of it, that is more or less what they are still.

The dance of the last cigarette which began when I was twenty has not reached its last figure yet.

My resolutions are less drastic and, as I grow older, I become more indulgent to my weaknesses. When one is old one can afford to smile at life and all it contains.

did I really love cigarettes so much because I was able to throw all the responsibility for my own incompetence on them? Who knows whether, if I had given up smoking, I should really have become the strong perfect man I imagined?

Perhaps it was this very doubt which bound me to my vice, because life is so much pleasanter if one is able to believe in one’s own latent greatness.

I only put this forward as a possible explanation of my youthful weakness, but without any very great conviction.

Probably I left that room just because it had become the tomb of my good resolutions, and I felt it impossible to form any fresh ones there.

I am sure a cigarette has a more poignant flavour when it is the last.

The others have their own special taste too, peculiar to them, but it is less poignant. The last has an aroma all its own, bestowed by a sense of victory over oneself and the sure hope of health and strength in the immediate future.

“Ninth day of the ninth month, in the year 1899.” Surely a most significant date! The new century furnished me with other dates equally harmonious, though in a different way. “First day of the first month in the year 1901.”

Even to-day I feel that if only that date could repeat itself I should be able to begin a new life.

But there is no lack of dates in the calendar, and with a little imagination each of them might be adapted to a good resolution. I remember the following, for instance, because it seemed to me to contain an undeniable categorical imperative:

In order to make it seem a little less foolish I tried to give a philosophic content to the malady of “the last cigarette.”

You strike a noble attitude, and say: “Never again!” But what becomes of the attitude if you keep your word?

You can only preserve it if you keep on renewing your resolution. And then Time, for me, is not that unimaginable thing which never stops. For me, but only for me, it comes again.

But what becomes of the attitude if you keep your word? You can only preserve it if you keep on renewing your resolution. And then Time, for me, is not that unimaginable thing which never stops. For me, but only for me, it comes again.

Ill-health is a conviction, and I was born with that conviction.

I should not remember much about the illness I had when I was twenty if I had not described it to a doctor at the time.

Ill-health is a conviction, and I was born with that conviction. I should not remember much about the illness I had when I was twenty if I had not described it to a doctor at the time.

It is curious how much easier it is to remember what one has put into words, than feelings which never vibrated on the air.

I went to that doctor because I had been told that he cured nervous diseases by electricity. I thought I might derive from electricity the strength necessary to give up smoking.

“

No one is ever satisfied with his lot.

”

Directly I had smoked it I felt remorse and again began making the very resolution I had tried to suppress.

The way was longer, but the end was the same.

That wretch Olivi suggested one day that we should have a bet together in order to strengthen my resolution.

It was the first time she had ever joined in my efforts to cure myself. Up till then she had refused to take my disease seriously and only said that smoking was one way of living, and not such a bad one either.

I think that after our marriage she was relieved to find I never regretted my liberty; I was much too occupied in regretting other things.

We went to the sanatorium the very day on which Olivi had told me he could on no account stay on after the following month. We packed some fresh linen in a trunk and went off that evening to Dr. Muli’s.

Surely I had not forgotten that one did not so very readily fall in love with my wife? It is true the doctor eyed her feet, but of course he had only been planning what shoes he should buy for his mistress.

Suddenly I discovered I had smoked my last cigarette; and it was not yet midnight but eleven o’clock, an impossible hour for a last cigarette.

I opened a book. I read it without understanding a word. I saw visions. The page I was looking at suddenly turned into a photograph of Dr. Muli in the full glory of his beauty and elegance. I could bear it no longer!

First of all she confided to me that this was just the kind of work she really enjoyed.

She thought everyone ought to have the right to pass an hour or two every day in a comfortable arm-chair, with a bottle of really good brandy in front of them.

I tried to converse a little too. I asked her if that was how her work had been arranged while her husband was alive.

“

It is only the living who care!

” I cried, banging my fist on the table.

In the hall the door was opened for me at once by a woman. I had no money with me, so I muttered: “I’ll give you something another time.”

You never can tell what will happen in the future.

Things often repeat themselves with me: it was not at all impossible that I might pass that way again.

My son, sleeping peacefully next door, was certainly not likely to begin either criticising me or imitating me for a very long time.

There was absolutely no hurry.

In his incapacity for business he resembled me, but it was the only thing we had in common; if it comes to comparing us, I am bound to say that of the two I was the stronger character.

Everything I have put down in my notebooks proves quite clearly that I have, and have always had, a strong impulse to become better; this is perhaps my greatest misfortune.

My many dreams of strength and balance can only be interpreted in this sense. All this was quite outside my father’s ken. He was perfectly satisfied with himself as he was, and I doubt if he ever made any effort to improve himself.

He pleaded a fit of distraction, and with such persistence that she at last believed him. The only consequence was that my mother never went to that dressmaker again, nor did my father.

In his place I think I should have ended by confessing, but probably without giving up the dressmaker; for where I halt, there I take root.

My father, like so many family men, was an adept in the art of least resistance. He was at peace with his family and with himself. He only read safe and moral books, not out of hypocrisy but from genuine conviction.

This made him feel that he had conquered his weakness and he was no longer worried by it. He insisted on my keeping a notebook too, but I only used it for putting down a few last cigarettes.

As for my supposed contempt for serious things, I think his fault was to take too many things in this world seriously.

For example: when, after leaving the Law for Chemistry, I obtained his permission to go back again to Law, he said good-naturedly: “It is quite clear to me that you are mad.”

He laughed gaily and said: “

It is more fun to eat when there are two of us.

”

I liked her simple way of talking all the more because I myself could not open my mouth without misrepresenting things or people, for otherwise I should have seen no use in talking at all.

Talking seemed to me an event in itself which must not be hampered by any other events.

But I had a particular dislike for perfidious Albion, and I showed it without fear of offending Ada who, by the way, had shown neither dislike nor love for England.

I refused to accept her aid.

There was nothing oracular about that cat; it was fate itself.

Ada opened her eyes and insisted on further explanations. “Do you mean to say that cat symbolised for you the whole English race?”

At last that memorable visit came to an end.

It is the most difficult thing in the world to make exactly the marriage you want; as you may see from my own case, where my resolution to get married was made long before my choice of a bride.

Why didn’t I go about and meet a great many more girls before choosing one? No, I really felt I should dislike seeing too many women, and I did not want to tire myself.

I expected nothing of the kind. I meant to speak to her, but later. If I waited so long it was because I was so unsure of myself.

I was always waiting to become nobler and stronger, more worthy of my divine mistress. This might always happen from one day to another.

Why not wait?

I took flowers every day to each of the three girls, and regaled them with my eccentricities; above all I was guilty of inconceivable levity in telling them the story of my life.

Everyone remembers his past with greater vividness as the present becomes more important.

Dying men in their last delirium are supposed to see their whole life spread out before them. My past clutched at me now with the violence of a last farewell, because I had the feeling that I was leaving it far behind me.

I don’t quite remember in which part, for I told them to so many other girls before Malfenti’s daughters that without any conscious alteration on my part they constantly suffered slight modifications tending to make them more interesting.

They began to be true from the moment when it would have been impossible for me to tell the story differently.

I am no longer interested in proving their truth. I should be sorry to undeceive Augusta who likes to believe that I invented them. As for Ada, I believe she has now changed her opinion and believes them to be true.

I had come by now to desire Ada with my whole heart; my fancy had made her cheek still smoother, her hands and feet still smaller and her waist still more slender; I desired her as my wife and as my mistress.

But one’s first step in approaching a woman is the decisive one.

On three consecutive days I found myself received only by the other two girls. Ada’s absence was explained the first time by a duty visit, the second by her not feeling well;

So there was really no need for me to go on exercising my fancy on the question of the state of Ada’s mind. But it is difficult to restrain oneself from brooding on a matter which concerns one so nearly.

Man would be a more fortunate animal if he could.

While I was occupied in dressing, which I did that day with exaggerated care, I could think of only one thing: Had I done well in kissing Ada’s hand, or had I done ill in not kissing her also on the lips?

I was thinking hard, but somewhat confusedly. I wanted to understand; I felt I must find out quickly what she was driving at.

If you open your eyes too wide you don’t see so well.

The possibility of their wanting to turn me out of the house did occur to me, but I thought I might dismiss it. I was innocent, for I had not paid court to Augusta whom they wanted to protect.

If I learned, and I could only learn it from Giovanni, that Ada was definitely lost to me, at least I should no longer have to contend with time, which would then flow peacefully on without my having to urge it forward.

Something settled is always calm because it is dissociated from time.

I at once went in search of Giovanni. I had to make two journeys; one to his office, which is in the street we still call New House Street, because it was called so by our ancestors.

I at once suggested to him a number of cures.

It is the best way of simulating keen sympathy without much trouble to oneself.

But he had tried them all. Then I made a further suggestion:

I did not like lemons, but if they could procure for me immunity from the results of doing all the things I most enjoyed I would have eaten quite a number.

Complete freedom consists in doing what you want on condition that you do something else as well which you like less. True slavery is being forced to abstain: Tantalus, not Hercules.

Tullio pretended to be anxious to hear my news. I was determined not to tell him anything about my unhappy love-affair, but I had to find an outlet somehow.

He had studied the anatomy of the leg and foot. He told me with amusement that when one is walking rapidly each step takes no more than half a second, and in that half second no fewer than fifty-four muscles are set in motion.

I listened in bewilderment. I at once directed my attention to my legs and tried to discover the infernal machine.

I thought I had succeeded in finding it. I could not of course distinguish all its fifty-four parts, but I discovered something terrifically complicated which seemed to get out of order directly I began thinking about it.

I turned indignantly.

Who had dared to interrupt the explanations I had not even begun?

A beardless youth, dark and pale, was gazing anxiously at her. I in my turn looked at Ada, in the vain hope that she would invoke my aid.

I limped as I walked, but as nobody took any notice I did not make much of it. I kept looking at Ada and tried to forget everything else, including our companion.

I like to live in the moment, and I never give the future a thought, unless it casts its shadow too obviously over the present.

Ada was walking between us, and her face wore a vague unchanging expression of happiness which was almost a smile. That happy look was new to her. For whom was her smile intended?

In this case all that I had to do was to take a more lenient view of my capabilities as a violinist. In all the arts sound judgment is the result of comparison, and that was lacking here.

Besides, one’s own violin resounds so close to one’s ear that it reaches the heart very quickly.

At last, somewhat exhausted I left off playing, and said to myself:

This was not due to conceit, but to my usual incurable optimism.

Every fresh misfortune which threatens, annihilates me in the first moment, but I very soon recover, in the sure faith that I shall be able to circumvent it.

In this case all that I had to do was to take a more lenient view of my capabilities as a violinist. In all the arts sound judgment is the result of comparison, and that was lacking here.

Ada could not set up her opinion against her mother’s. It immediately had the effect it could not fail to have on a man of my temperament. All my ill will vanished and I wanted to spare Guido any further suffering.

The world would certainly be less disagreeable if there were more people like me in it.

I sat down beside him, and without taking any notice of the others, I said:

It caused me as much pain as to hear my mistress had been unfaithful to me. In spite of the affection she showed to Guido I thought she might still be mine, but I felt I should never be able to forgive her attitude.

Perhaps I think too slowly to follow the events which go on developing, without waiting for the impression previous events have made on my brain to be cancelled.

I felt compelled to go straight on in the path my resolution had marked out for me. It was sheer blind obstinacy. I also found it necessary to strengthen my resolution by renewing it.

She put out her plump hand, which I almost instinctively kissed. Clearly there was no possibility of doing anything else. I don’t mind confessing that at that moment a feeling of immense satisfaction pervaded me.

I had no longer any decision to make. Everything was decided for me.

At last I had obtained certainty.

My bride was much less ugly than I had imagined, and it was by kissing her that I discovered her chief beauty: that she blushed so readily.

Whenever I kissed her a flame was lit in my honour, and I continued to kiss her more out of scientific curiosity than with the ardour of a lover.

But I felt desire for her too, which made the time pass rather less heavily. It was fortunate that Augusta and her mother did not allow my flame to burn itself out all at once, as I could often have wished.

The thought of what I had said gave me a bad taste in my mouth for several days, whereas I can truthfully say that the thought that I had wanted to kill Guido did not upset me even for an hour.

But to kill someone, even treacherously, is more manly than to wound a friend by betraying his confidence.

But Augusta did wrong to be jealous of Ada even then. It was not in order to see Ada that I was twisting my neck round like that. Guido’s eloquence helped to while the time away.

After that the matter was never discussed again between us, for marriage is much simpler than being engaged.

Once one is married, one no longer talks about love, and if ever one feels the need to do so the senses intervene and enforce silence.

But animal instinct may have become so humanised as to undergo a complicated process of falsification, and it may happen that as one bends over a woman’s head one evokes a light which is not there.

She knew all about the things which drive a man to desperation, but they seemed to change their nature when she regarded them.

Even if the world does go round, that is no reason for being seasick.

On the contrary, the world goes round but everything else stays in its place. And these stationary things are of immense importance;

“It is lucky one only has to visit museums on one’s honeymoon, and then never again!”

And it is true that life lacks the monotony of museums. There come days which seem worthy of being framed, but they are so full of conflicting sounds, of line and colour and living, burning light that they never become tedious.

Health impels people to action, and to take upon themselves a whole world of worries. Directly the museums are closed one must begin buying things. Though she had not lived in it, Augusta knew our house much better than I did;

And it is true that life lacks the monotony of museums. There come days which seem worthy of being framed, but they are so full of conflicting sounds, of line and colour and living, burning light that they never become tedious.

Health impels people to action, and to take upon themselves a whole world of worries.

Directly the museums are closed one must begin buying things. Though she had not lived in it, Augusta knew our house much better than I did; she knew that a certain room had no looking-glass;

Had she suddenly become aware of her own fearful strength and did it fill her with despair? In that case all humanity ought to have joined in her lamentation. But I discovered later that she had no conception of what health really is.

Health cannot analyse itself even if it looks at itself in the glass. It is only we invalids who can know anything about ourselves.

It was on that occasion that she told me how she had loved me even before we met. She had loved me from the first moment that her father had mentioned my name and spoken of me in the following terms:

One day I decided to make her a splendid present: I decided to work! She wanted me to, and I also thought that work would be good for my health.

It is natural that someone who has no time to be ill actually is less ill.

So I went to business, and if I did not persevere it was really not my fault. I went with the best intentions and in the most humble frame of mind. I never suggested taking over the management of the business;

Augusta’s religion did not take time to acquire or put into practice. You bowed your knee and returned to ordinary life again immediately! That was all. Religion for me was a very different thing.

If I had only believed, nothing else in the world would have mattered to me.

I must confess that boredom sometimes visited my perfectly appointed study—or was it worry, that although I really felt the strength to work I kept on waiting for life to set me some task?

There had never before been such abundance of tenderness in my house, and Augusta seemed blissfully happy. I was always punctual in my observance of what I called the family time-table.

I have such a tender conscience that I was always trying by my present behaviour to diminish the remorse I must feel in the future.

That I really did make some effort to resist is proved by the fact that I did not reach Carla in one bound, but by slow degrees.

I obeyed her command; I thought no more about it and went to sleep again.

At night speech is like a bright ray in the darkness. It suddenly lights up reality before which the creations of one’s fancy fade away.

Why was I so afraid of poor Carla when I had not even become her lover yet? It was clear that I had done my best to frighten myself about the whole situation.

She told me between her sobs that she had suffered too much seeing me come in like that. She was crying out of self-pity, which one always feels when one sees another person pitying one.

It is less the pain which makes one’s tears flow than the cause of that pain. One weeps when one arraigns the world of injustice.

And it was surely unjust to force that lovely girl to work when one might have been kissing her instead.

I had deplored my own infidelity so much beforehand that you would have thought I might easily have avoided it.

It is easy to laugh at anyone for being wise after the event, but it is almost as useless to be wise before it.

During those hours of torment I wrote the date of the day in my dictionary against the letter C (Carla) with the comment: “Last betrayal.” But my first actual infidelity, which led to all the subsequent ones, only took place on the following day.

I thought it ought to be so arranged as to allow one to have intercourse occasionally with other women without having to fear the consequences. Even with women one could never love. I felt no trace of remorse.

Therefore I don’t think that remorse springs from regret for having done something wrong, but rather from a recognition of one’s own sinful nature. The higher part of one’s body bends down to observe and judge the lower, and finds it monstrous.

The sense of horror it experiences at the sight is what we call remorse. In classical tragedy the victim did not return to life, and yet all remorse vanished: which meant that the deformity was cured and that it was idle to lament any longer.

… only when a conflict was going on in my mind between the two women, and the extravagant signs of affection I gave Augusta made it easier for me to conceal from her that the shadow of another woman lay darkly between us for the moment.

Therefore I am bound to say that Augusta preferred me just when I was in fact less wholly hers.

I myself was rather surprised at being so calm, and attributed it to the fact that I had succeeded in making Carla accept the envelope of good resolutions. Not that I imagined I had settled my account with her in full.

The old man talked in a low voice, as if he were afraid of disturbing the peace of the dying, and panted heavily as he talked. I lowered my voice too.

People do that in token of respect, but perhaps the dying would rather be accompanied on their last journey by loud, clear voices which would remind them of life.

The old man told me that a nurse was looking after the invalid. He made me stand reverentially outside the door for some time. Copler, with the death-rattle in his throat, was measuring out his last hours of breath.

It was fortunate for me that some train of thought suddenly brought to my mind the corpse over which I had vainly tried to shed tears. If this had not banished my thoughts about the two women I should have ended by speaking of Carla.

Have I not always had a great desire for confession, even when wine has not made me more expansive still?

So I spoke about Copler instead, for I wanted them all to know that I had lost a great friend that day. They would be more ready to excuse my behaviour.

It was a pity, for in asking for forgiveness I could have confessed my fault, and the dinner would have lasted long enough to give me a chance of repairing that first unfortunate joke.

There is a time for everything in this world.

Not all drunkards fall immediately under the influence of wine. When I have drunk too much I go on analysing my fellow-creatures just as I do when sober, and probably with the same result.

He could not find it, nor did anyone press for it. Not even Señor Francesco, who as he had only seen me for the first time that morning, could not be expected to know much about me. I was not at all offended.

The consciousness that one has great wrongs to repair subdues one’s pride a good deal.

I was ready to accept insults readily, so long as they were accompanied by an affection which I knew I did not deserve.

I had some difficulty in finding the thread again. I related how we had at last come to the honeymoon, and how I had made love to her in all the museums of Italy.

I was so up to my neck in lies that I even threw in that mendacious detail, though it served no purpose whatever.

And yet they say, “In vino veritas.”

So it was nice to talk about it. She asked me to tell her my ideas about it, and I immediately discovered one which seemed to me to grow out of that day’s experience.

A woman, I said, varied in value much more than any share on the Bourse.

Alberta misunderstood me, and thought I meant what is of course a common-place, that a woman of a certain age has quite a different value from a younger woman. I tried to explain myself more clearly;

The act had become significant by being talked about, and the words by being put into practice.... So long as she remained unmarried she always greeted me with a smile and a blush; afterwards, with an angry blush without the smile.

Women are made like that. Each day, as it comes, provides them with a new interpretation of the one that went before.

Their life can never be at all monotonous. As regards myself, the interpretation of my action always remained the same: the theft of a small thing possessing great charm.

afterwards, with an angry blush without the smile. Women are made like that. Each day, as it comes, provides them with a new interpretation of the one that went before.

Their life can never be at all monotonous.

As regards myself, the interpretation of my action always remained the same: the theft of a small thing possessing great charm. It was Alberta’s fault that for a certain length of time I tried to make her remember that act of mine;

One remembers a look one has cast at another person, as well as, or even better than one’s own words.

A look is even more important than a word, because if you hunt the whole dictionary through you will never be able to undress a woman with a word.

I know now that the look I gave Ada contradicted the words I had pictured myself saying to her, and thereby simplified them. Through her eyes I had tried to pierce her clothes and her skin. And it had quite clearly meant:

Through her eyes I had tried to pierce her clothes and her skin. And it had quite clearly meant: “So will you come to bed at once?”

Wine is a great danger not because it brings the truth to light; but on the contrary, because it reveals what is past and forgotten and plays no part in one’s present conscious will.

All the fantastic ideas one toyed with in the more or less recent past, and has long since forgotten, come crowding to the surface; it traces afresh what one had erased, and reads whatever is still perceptible in our hearts.

it traces afresh what one had erased, and reads whatever is still perceptible in our hearts. If one has made a mistake in endorsing a cheque, it is easy enough to correct it; but in the heart those erasures are impossible.

Our whole life-history is written there, and wine proclaims it abroad, regardless of the emendations of time.

Augusta and I took a carriage home.

Her skin seemed almost transparent, yet scarcely a trace of the delicate veins appeared in it, and something in its soft lines called up all my instincts of love and protection.

I was ready to offer it all to her now unconditionally, even at the very moment when I most wanted to go back to Augusta; for Carla seemed only to ask for a fatherly love which I could give her without any infidelity.

What a satisfaction for me! I could stay there with Carla, giving all that the oval of her face demanded, and at the same time I could feel myself near Augusta!

Each week she had a new song to recite to me, carefully thought out both as to expression and articulation of the words. Perhaps certain tones ought to have been lighter, but no doubt she would find the right balance in time.

One decisive proof that Carla was an artist was the way she went on perfecting her songs without letting go of what was best in her first conception.

I often used to make her recite her earliest songs again, and there was always some new touch which was very much to the point.

Seeing how ignorant she was, it was remarkable that in spite of her efforts to give the utmost expression to the song she never introduced a false or exaggerated note.

Like a true artist she added a small stone to the building daily, without destroying what was there already.

The song was not stereotyped, only the sentiment which inspired it. Before she began singing Carla used always to pass her hand over her face, and that moment’s quiet sufficed to plunge her in the drama she had to create.

He was old and thin and withered. I never saw him again, but I cannot forget the light in his black eyes and the vitality which emanated from each point of his small person. He swore at the weather for making him so dirty.

I have always loved talking to people I don’t know. I feel quite safe and sound with them; it is quite a rest to be with them.

If only I take care not to limp I am all right.

I again made iron resolutions, which I took with me to Carla, forgot while I was with her and remembered again almost before I left her.

The resolutions existed for their own sake, and had no practical results whatever.

And for the time being everything remained as before. The summer passed away, and carried off my father-in-law.

“The young lady sat down beside me too, without seeing me.”

It is important to remember, if one is going to tell lies, that one must only tell essential ones if one wants to be believed.

When we next met, Tullio said to me with his native common sense:

We were never to see each other again. She refused the envelope which I always carried in my pocket, and would not even accept any memento from me.

Every trace of our past must be banished from the new life on which we were entering.

Then I consented to kiss her on the forehead like a father, as she had wanted me to at first.

They had been too pleasant to be binding. But my anxiety to know what Carla really thought about it made me hasten to see her.

What I hoped was that I should find her in the mood for forming a fresh resolution.

So life would flow on, rich in enjoyment but more still in efforts to get better; a great part of each day would be devoted to well-doing, only a small part to regrets.

I went to the Giardino Pubblico and walked about for half an hour, to give myself time to think things over. They had become so clear as to baffle me altogether.

Suddenly, piteously, I found myself forced to keep a resolution like that.

I felt ill, really ill. I limped along, trying in vain to contend with my bodily distress. I sometimes have attacks like this; I can breathe perfectly well, but I count each breath I draw, because each requires a special effort of the will.

In it she called me neither Zeno nor Dario. She only said “Thank you! I hope you will be happy too with your wife who so much deserves to be happy!” She was, of course, speaking of Ada.

The favourable moment had not lasted, and it never does last with women unless you take hold of them by the hair of their head.

My desire had taken the form of mad rage. Not with Augusta! My mind was so full of Carla that I felt quite remorseful, and all the time I was with Augusta I wore a forced, idiotic smile which she took to be genuine.

I spent the whole afternoon and evening with Augusta. She was very busy, and I stayed beside her doing nothing.

I felt as if I were being carried along by a stream, a stream of clear water: my respectable home life.

I abandoned myself to the stream, which carried me along but did not purify me. On the contrary it only emphasised my stain.

I spent the whole afternoon and evening with Augusta. She was very busy, and I stayed beside her doing nothing. I felt as if I were being carried along by a stream, a stream of clear water: my respectable home life.

I abandoned myself to the stream, which carried me along but did not purify me. On the contrary it only emphasised my stain.

Naturally during the long night which followed I formed a fresh resolution. The first was the most iron of all. I determined to buy a pistol, and shoot myself directly I found myself turning towards that part of the town.

But there was something besides. I had not yet given up hopes of becoming a good man of business, and I thought I should learn more by teaching Guido than by taking lessons from Olivi.

Many people can only learn by listening to themselves, or at least cannot learn anything by listening to others.

I had other reasons for wishing to ally myself to Guido. I wanted to be of use to him.

I sacrificed my freedom to him for years and allowed him to place me in the most odious position, simply in order that I might help him.

It was either a real manifestation of disease or of great benevolence, both of which qualities are closely related to each other.

This remained true, even though with time we developed a strong affection, as often happens between people who see each other every day. My feeling for him was very strong indeed. When he disappeared I went on missing him for a very long time:

I would really have preferred a rather less implicit obedience, but it was my job to decide exactly what was necessary in an office. It was then that I began to discover the fundamental difference between Guido and myself.

All the knowledge I had acquired was used by me for talking, and by him for action.

When he had acquired all the information I could give him he would buy.

It really looked as if a knowledge of book-keeping had made him see the world in quite a new light.

He saw debtors and creditors everywhere, even when two people were only fighting or kissing each other.

On his first entry into business he used the utmost caution. He turned down many business propositions, and continued to do so for six months, with the calm air of one who knows better.

and the monosyllable always appeared to be the result of careful calculation, even though he had never set eyes on the goods in question. All his meditations were directed towards discovering exactly how a certain transaction would figure in the accounts, whether successful or unsuccessful.

As book-keeping was the last thing he had learnt it filled his whole horizon and coloured all he saw.

I am sorry to have to speak so ill of my poor friend, but I must tell of things as they were, if only to understand myself better.

“

What a lot of stamps we should save if we could know beforehand how many people will take any notice of them!

”

… sat waiting for the final word (which I thought had been said already), and to hasten it remarked that she was taking a new situation partly because she was anxious to get experience, and that therefore she would be satisfied with quite a small salary.

One of the first effects of feminine beauty on a man is that it removes his avarice.

Guido shrugged his shoulders as much as to say that he took no interest in such insignificant details, offered her a salary which she gratefully accepted, and gravely advised her to study shorthand.

He said he was afraid of our putting the evil eye on him, and to please him I at once gave in. I knew, as a mathematical certainty, that nothing but good wishes could come from me, but I recognised that he might think otherwise.

In this world we generally like the people we don’t actually hate, but reserve our really fervent wishes for an undertaking in which we have a personal interest.

Every detail of the business was arranged, and I remember Guido even calculating how many months he would be able to maintain his family and the office on what he would get from it;

“

It is curious how few people in the world can reconcile themselves to small losses, whereas they have no difficulty whatsoever in reconciling themselves to big ones.

”

my unexacting Carla, who only asked to be allowed to live quietly at my side, till the day when she asked never to see me again.

A mistress shared is the least compromising one can have.

At that time I had not thought things out so clearly as I have since, but I had certain intuitions which I now know to be true.

But a foolish tongue acts independently, in the interests of a small part of our being which otherwise would feel itself to be defeated, and continues to simulate fight when the fight is already over.

Words are spoken with intention to wound or caress, and often they turn against the mouth which utters them and burn it.

I noticed she had lost the lovely complexion which had won her such speedy admission to our office. I would not admit that it could be bodily suffering which had caused the change in her appearance, and I attributed it to her love for Guido.

During that brief moment in the dark, I felt as if I were shut into a room alone with that tall and doubtless elegant woman.

The most pleasant adventures sometimes happen when one least expects them, and seeing her come deliberately towards me I had for a moment a delightful sensation which disappeared directly I heard Carmen’s hoarse voice.

She pretended to be pleased when she heard I was to be of the party. But with a voice like hers, and in the dark, pretence was impossible.

Then Guido remarked that the tide was on the turn, and that we were not likely to catch any more fish. He said fishermen believe that the fish won’t bite when it is slack water, and that therefore they cannot be caught.

He moralised on the dangers an animal was led into by its appetite.

Then he began laughing and said, quite unaware that he was compromising himself:

At the moment I wrote them my fables seemed to me excellent.

The things which issue from our own brain have a peculiarly charming air, especially when they are newly born.

To tell the truth I still like my dialogue, even now that I have had so much practice in composition. “The Hymn to Life” sung by a dying creature cannot fail to arouse the sympathy of those who have to watch it die.

The Greek phrase “Wise fool” would be very appropriate to Guido. He was often very astute, but he was often very stupid.

He was full of ideas, but did nothing with them except to grease the steep incline on which he kept slipping lower and lower.

The twins descended on him at the same time as the sulphate of copper.

But the same thing happens in the community; now it will be Darwin who reigns supreme, whereas before it was Robespierre or Napoleon.

At one time it will be Liebig or even Leopardi; at another, Bismarck fills the whole horizon!

But I alone lived by Basedow! He seemed to me to have penetrated to the root of life, and shown it to be as follows: all living beings are ranged along a certain line, at one end of which is Basedow’s disease.

At the other end of the line are those wretched beings, shrivelled up by native avarice, and doomed to die from a disease which looks like exhaustion but is really cowardice.

The happy mean between these two maladies is to be found in the middle of the line, and is called health, though it is really only a suspension of movement.

Between the centre and Basedow’s end are to be found all those whose life is consumed in desire, ambition, pleasure or even work;

for a long time I thought too much about Basedow. I still believe that at whatever particular spot of the universe one settles down one ends by becoming poisoned; it is essential to keep moving.

Life has its poisons, but counter-poisons too which balance them. It is only by moving about that one can avoid the first and profit by the second.

My disease became an obsession, a dream, almost a nightmare to me. It must have originated in a certain line of reasoning; by perversion we mean a deviation from health, the kind of health which was ours during part of our life.

I protested, laughing, and teased her a little. Ada was not the significant figure in my dream, but Basedow, and I told her about my studies and their practical application. But I don’t know whether I succeeded in convincing her.

It is difficult to defend yourself when you are taken unawares in a dream.

It is quite a different matter to return to your wife fresh from having betrayed her, and in full consciousness of so doing.

Of course the result was different, but I now know for a certainty that it deserved neither praise nor blame. The point really is whether one is bound to a wheel that is moving or standing still.

The difficulty of freeing oneself is the same in either case.

I went on going to the office for several days after I had finished my balance-sheet, although I had made up my mind not to go again. When I left the house I was still uncertain;

and directly one has spoken one begins to wonder if what one has said was worth the breath spent on it, and occasionally discovers that one has started a new idea. I said:

“Life is neither good nor bad; it is original.”

When I thought it over I felt as if I had said something rather important. Looking at it like that I felt as if I were seeing life for the first time, with all its gaseous, liquid and solid bodies.

My dismay at finding that I was not really good was becoming less acute. I felt as if I had solved that distressing problem. One is neither good nor bad, just as one is not so many other things besides.

Goodness is the light which in brief flashes illuminates the darkness of the human soul.

A burning torch is needed to light the way, (there had been moments in my life when such a torch shone on my path and it certainly would again), and the human intelligence must choose by its light the way it will have to take …

But that did not prove much. To get to business: What advice should I give to Guido the next day? Should I rely on my inspiration?

But even at the gaming-table one cannot always rely on one’s inspiration when one is playing with other people’s money.

To keep a house of business going one must find some work for it every day, and that can only be done by devoting hours on end to organising it.

I fell asleep again with a quiet conscience; I had found a way of saving Guido without condemning myself to perpetual bondage; in fact I was now completely free.

Nothing is more disagreeable than to have one’s advice rejected when one has even sacrificed several hours of sleep to thinking it out.

I was obliged to sacrifice an illusion too; the idea that I might be of some use in arranging Guido’s affairs for him. I had really made a superhuman effort.

Wasn’t it my duty to take her in my arms, and spare her the shame of having to ask anything of me? A host of resolutions sprang up in my mind at the same moment!

One of the great difficulties of life is guessing what a woman wants.

Listening to what she says is no help, for a whole speech may be wiped out by a single look, and even that is no guide if one is alone with her, by her own invitation, in a cosy, dark little room.

She suddenly seized me by the hand. A thrill went through me.

A woman who offers you her hand offers you a great deal.

I have always felt this; and when I take a woman’s hand I feel as if I were taking her altogether.

“You ended by marrying a queerer man even than me, Ada!”

It is strange how a word can bridge time!

It is itself an event which is linked to other events. And those words of mine became a tragic event because they were addressed to Ada.

“In order to relieve you of all responsibility I am ready to make the entries myself and sign them with my own name.”

I saw quite clearly that he wanted to go on dreaming, but there is no room for dreams in double entries!

I remembered all I had undertaken on the heights of Via Belvedere, then I remembered Ada in her dark little boudoir, and I said magnanimously:

I anyway implied that it would have been useless for me to keep silence. It would have been much better, and I should have felt much more loyal and upright, if I had said straight out that I had no secrets from Augusta.

The simple fact of pretending not to have done some perfectly innocent thing which it would have been much better to own up to, is quite enough to endanger a really genuine friendship.

I will set down here, though it has no bearing on Guido nor on my story, that a few days later that cackling broker, with whom we had had some dealings over the sulphate of copper, stopped me in the street and gazing up at …

I won’t repeat here all the phrases I passed in review, trying to find something which might take the place of that long, tender, eloquent handshake—but only the phrases I actually wrote. I said a good deal about my approaching old age.

I could not stand still a moment without growing old.

Each time the blood circulated in my veins something crept into my flesh and bones which betokened old age. Every morning when I woke the world took on a greyer hue; I only did not notice it because everything was of the same dull hue.

I said a good deal about my approaching old age. I could not stand still a moment without growing old. Each time the blood circulated in my veins something crept into my flesh and bones which betokened old age.

Every morning when I woke the world took on a greyer hue; I only did not notice it because everything was of the same dull hue.

There was not one touch of the colouring of the day before; otherwise I should have detected it and my regret would have driven me to despair.

he saw it caressing one stock and throttling another, or again, giving people lessons in industry and temperance. Only crafty and capable people could hope to do business with such a being.

There was plenty of money lying scattered about on the floor of the Bourse, but it was not so easy to stoop down and pick it up.

I offered him a cigarette and kept him waiting while I dealt with some correspondence. He grew tired of waiting after a while, and said he could not stay any longer.

Something seemed to have upset my balance. I could not understand myself. Why did I feel exactly as if Carla had just given me up? Nothing fresh had happened to me.

I honestly believe that I have always needed to be in the middle of an adventure, or of some complication which gives the illusion of one.

Yet there was nothing in the least complicated now in my relations with Ada.

Why don’t they live and die in silence? On the other hand it is pleasant to see the joy of someone who has succeeded in securing a good share of the booty, and flaunts himself in the sun, amidst the plaudits of the crowd.

The only cry I should allow is the cry of triumph.

But Guido! He not only lacked the power to conquer, but even to hold the riches he had got. He would come from the gaming-table and weep over his losses. He could not even behave like a gentleman; he sickened me.

In my opinion, not even people who are more innocent and more unhappy than Guido deserve pity, otherwise there would be no room for anything but that feeling, which would be very tedious.

The law of nature does not confer the right to be happy, on the contrary it condemns us to pain and suffering.

Wherever the feast is spread parasites will flock to it from all parts, and if there are not enough of them they hasten to breed more.

I felt I had regained the freedom I had lost when I set about trying to educate Guido and put him on the right path.

The teacher is really much more chained than the pupil.

I had fully made up my mind to get the money for him.

After being confined to the office for so many days, my lungs expanded and I found it delightful to exercise my limbs. I was full of health and strength.

Health is all a matter of comparison.

I compared myself with poor Guido, and rose victorious from the same battle in which he lay vanquished. Everything around me seemed to breathe out health and energy. Everywhere the young, green grass was springing;

I have finished with psycho-analysis. After practising it assiduously for six whole months I find I am worse than before.

I have not yet told the doctor, but nothing will make me change my mind. Yesterday I sent to say that I was prevented from coming, and I shall let him expect me for a few days.

My God! He has only studied medicine, and so he has no idea what writing in Italian means to us who talk dialect but cannot express ourselves in writing.

A written confession is always mendacious.

We lie with every word we speak in the Tuscan tongue!

Was it not like the miracle of plucking in October the roses of May? The doctor himself assured me that the image in my memory would be clear and complete, so that it would be another day added to my life.

The roses would have all their fragrance, even perhaps their thorns.

And by dint of pursuing these memory-pictures, I at last really overtook them. I know now that I invented them. But invention is a creative act, not merely a lie.

And by dint of pursuing these memory-pictures, I at last really overtook them. I know now that I invented them.

But invention is a creative act, not merely a lie.

My inventions were like the phantasies of fever, which walk about the room so that one can survey them from all sides and even touch them. They had the solidity, the colour and the movement of living things. My desire created these images.

I must confess that the threatened punishment positively hurt me, and immediately afterwards I felt sorry to think that I had not been there to see mamma’s protecting gesture, which I know must have followed.

But who can stop those pictures, once they have taken flight through time, which never before had seemed so much like space?

At least I thought so while I still believed in the authenticity of the pictures.

From thence onwards those sittings became a torture to me, and

I went on with them only because I have always found it as difficult to stop once I am in motion, as to start when I am at rest.

Occasionally, when he said something altogether too wide of the mark, I ventured mildly to object. It was by no means true, as he assumed, that every word and every thought of mine were criminal. That made him stare.

Of course I am not attempting to deny this, and it even made me laugh when the doctor, in saying it, put on an air of Christopher Columbus discovering America.

All the same I think he must be the only person in the world who, hearing that I wanted to go to bed with two lovely women, must rack his brain to try and find a reason for it!

I found it still more difficult to bear what he felt it necessary to say about my relations with Guido. He had heard from my own account how much I disliked Guido on first making his acquaintance.

When that came it always responded in the same way. In psycho-analysis, on the other hand, neither the same images nor the same words ever repeat themselves. It ought to be called by another name: psychical adventure, perhaps. Yes, that is just what it is.

When one starts such an analysis, it is like entering a wood, not knowing whether one is going to meet a brigand or a friend. Nor is one quite sure which it has been, after the adventure is over.

In this respect psycho-analysis resembles spiritualism.

At last I was going to have a true analysis after all this psycho-analysis. I felt quite touched as I remembered the time, now long past, when I was myself a chemist and made true analyses; I thought fondly of retorts and re-agents.

The element which is being analysed sleeps till it is summoned imperiously to life by the re-agent.

There is no resistance in the retort, at least it yields to the smallest rise in temperature, and shamming is out of the question. Nothing took place in that retort to remind me of my behaviour with Dr.

But I loved my disease. I thought with sympathy of poor Copler who preferred real diseases to imaginary ones. I agreed with him now.

A real disease was so simple; you had only to let it work its will.

And, in fact, when I looked up the description of my sweet sickness in a medical prescriber, I found a whole programme of life (not of death!) drawn up for the various stages of the disease. Farewell resolutions! Henceforth I should be free of them.

You’ll see that you will want to come back to me of yourself, when you realise how much good I did you in a comparatively short space of time.”

What I really think is that, with his help and by dint of studying my psyche, I only infected myself with new diseases.

My one thought now is how to recover from his treatment. I avoid dreams and memories, which produced such a state of confusion in my poor head that it is hardly sure yet whether or not it is firmly fixed between my shoulders.

But except for July and August, December and January, there are no two successive months which have an equal number of days.

Time is really very ill-ordered!

In order to be able to concentrate better, I spent the afternoon of the second day alone, on the banks of the Isonzo. Nothing helps one to concentrate so well as gazing for a long time at running water.

In order to be able to concentrate better, I spent the afternoon of the second day alone, on the banks of the Isonzo.

Nothing helps one to concentrate so well as gazing for a long time at running water. One remains perfectly still oneself and all the necessary diversion is provided by the water, which is never the same for a single instant, either in colour or design.

It was a wonderful day. A strong wind must have been blowing in the upper air, for the clouds were continually changing shape, but down below there was no movement in the atmosphere.

Even when I was not thinking of my mistress, I still thought of her in the sense that I craved her forgiveness for thinking of other women as well. Other men leave their mistresses disillusioned and despairing of life.

I have never known life without desire, and illusions sprang up afresh for me after every shipwreck of my hopes, for I was always dreaming of limbs, of gestures, of a voice more perfect still.

I remembered that among the many lies I had imposed on that profound observer, Dr. S., one was that I had never betrayed my wife after Ada went away. He built up a whole theory on that lie.

At that moment the clouds opened at various points in the sky and let some sunrays through, which fell straight on Teresina, who was now about fifty yards away and more than thirty feet above me. She was dark and small, but shining!

The sun did not shine on me! When you are old, you have to stay in the shade, however witty you may be.

The war has reached me at last! I used to listen to stories of the war as if it were a war in times gone by, which it was amusing to talk about, but about which it would be foolish to excite oneself;