But it is not necessary to have the letters to form a clear idea of what they would be. Letters had always been a means of sentimental expansion for Madame Roland. She wrote, as she felt, invariably in the eloquent and glowing phrase which her emotion awakened; now with pathos and longing, frequently with the real grace and playfulness which her more spontaneous and natural moods caused. Her letters were invariably deeply personal. It was her own life and feelings which permeated them, and it was the sentiments, the interests, the tastes of her correspondent, which she sought to draw out and to which she responded. An intimate and sympathetic correspondence of this sort, even if the pretext for it and the present topic of it is public affairs, as it was in this case, soon takes a large part in a life. Close exchange of thought and sentiment, complete and satisfactory, is, perhaps, the finest and truest, as it is the rarest, experience possible between a man and a woman. When once realized, it becomes infinitely precious. Madame Roland and Buzot poured out to each other all their ambitions and dreams, their joys and their sorrows, sure of perfect understanding. At this time the thoughts which filled their minds were one, their emotions were one; both relied more and more upon the correspondence for stimulus. To Buzot, harassed by petty criminal trials, and married to a woman who, whatever her worth, could never be more to him than his housekeeper and the mother of his children, this intimacy of thought, and hope, and despair appeared like a realization of the perfect Platonic dream, and Madame Roland became a sacred and glorified figure in his imagination. But if a man and woman carry on such a correspondence for a few months and then are suddenly thrown into constant intercourse, their relation becomes at once infinitely delicate. It is only experience, wisdom, womanly tact, and an enormous force of self-renunciation which can control such a situation and save the friendship. When Buzot and Madame Roland first met at the end of September, 1792, she was ill prepared for resistance. The Revolution had suddenly appeared to her fierce, bloody, desperate,—a thing to disown. She could no longer see in it the divinity she had been worshipping. Her disillusion had been terrible. The impotence and languor which follow disillusion enfeebled her will, weakened her splendid enthusiasm, and threatened to drive her to the conclusion that all effort is worthless.