People who have been made to suffer by certain things cannot be reminded of them without a horror which paralyses every other pleasure, even that to be found in reading a story.
The great majority of men, especially in France, both desire and possess a fashionable woman, much in the way one might own a fine horse – as a luxury befitting a young man.
Why not make an end of it all? My life is a succession of griefs and bitter feelings. What is death? A very small matter, when all is said; only a fool would be concerned about it.
