She refused me nothing the most tender friendship
could grant; yet she granted me nothing that rendered her
unfaithful, and I had the mortification to see that the disorder
into which her most trifling favors had thrown all my senses had not
the least affect upon hers.
I have somewhere said, that nothing should be granted to the senses,
when we wish to refuse them anything. To prove how false this maxim
was relative to Madam d'Houdetot and how far she was right to depend
upon her own strength of mind, it would be necessary to enter into the
detail of our long and frequent conversations, and follow them, in
all, their liveliness, during the four months we passed together in an
intimacy almost without example between two friends of different sexes
who contain themselves within the bounds which we never exceeded.
Ah! if I had lived so long without feeling the power of real love,
my heart and senses abundantly paid the arrears. What, therefore,
are the transports we feel with the object of our affections by whom
we are beloved, since the passions of which my idol did not partake
inspired such as I felt?
But I am wrong in saying Madam d'Houdetot did not partake of the
passion of love; that which I felt was in some measure confined to
myself; yet love was equal on both sides, but not reciprocal. We
were both intoxicated with the passion, she for her lover, and I for
herself; our sighs and delicious tears were mingled together. Tender
confidants of the secrets of each other, there was so great a
similarity in our sentiments that it was impossible they should not
find some common point of union.
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