This so incensed me, that forgetting everything
but my friend Bacle, I went neither to the abbe nor the count, and was
no longer to be found at home. I paid no attention to repeated
reprimands, and at length was threatened with dismissal. This threat
was my ruin, as it suggested the idea that it was absolutely necessary
that Bacle should depart alone. From that moment I could think of no
other pleasure, no other situation or happiness than taking this
journey. To render the felicity still more complete, at the end of
it (though at an immense distance) I pictured to myself Madam de
Warrens; for as to returning to Geneva, it never entered into my
imagination. The hills, fields, brooks, and villages, incessantly
succeeded each other with new charms, and this delightful jaunt seemed
worthy to absorb my whole existence. Memory recalled, with
inexpressible pleasure, how charming the country had appeared in
coming to Turin; what then must it be, when, to the pleasure of
independence, should be added the company of a good-humored comrade of
my own age and disposition, without any constraint or obligation,
but free to go or stay as we pleased? Would it not be madness to
sacrifice the prospect of so much felicity to projects of ambition,
slow and difficult in their execution, and uncertain in their event?
But even supposing them realized, and in their utmost splendor, they
were not worth one quarter of an hour of the sweet pleasure and
liberty of youth.
Full of these wise conclusions, I conducted myself so improperly,
that (not indeed without some trouble) I got myself dismissed; for
on my return one night the maitre d'hotel gave me warning on the
part of the count.
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