“If it weren’t you ...” he began. “Well, old boy, it’s a curious thing that’s happened to me: ever since I have come to know her, all my desires have gone; I have none left at all. You remember in the old days how I used to be all fire and flame for twenty women at once whom I happened to pass by in the street (and that’s the very thing that prevented me from choosing any one of them); well, now it seems to me that I shall never be touched again by any other form of beauty than hers; that I shall never be able to love any other forehead than hers; her lips, her eyes. But what I feel for her is veneration; when I am with her every carnal thought seems an impiety. I think I was mistaken about myself, and that in reality I am very chaste by nature. Thanks to Laura, my instincts have been sublimated. I feel I have within me great unemployed forces. I should like to make them take up service. I envy the Carthusian who bends his pride to the rule of his order; the person to whom one says: “I count upon you.” I envy the soldier.... Or rather, no; I envy no one; but the turbulence I feel within me oppresses me and my aspiration is to discipline it. It’s like steam inside me; it may whistle as it escapes (that’s poetry), put in motion wheels and pistons; or even burst the engine. Do you know the act which I sometimes think would express me best? It’s.... Oh! I know well enough I shan’t kill myself; but I understand Dmitri Karamazof perfectly when he asks his brother if he understands a person killing himself out of enthusiasm, out of sheer excess of life ... just _bursting_.” An extraordinary radiance shone from his whole being. How well he expressed himself! Olivier gazed at him in a kind of ecstasy. “So do I,” he murmured timidly, “I understand killing oneself too; but it would be after having tasted a joy so great, that all one’s life to come would seem pale beside it; a joy so great, that it would make one feel: ‘I have had enough. I am content; never again shall I....’” But Bernard was not listening. He stopped. What was the use of talking to empty air? All his sky clouded over again. Bernard took out his watch: “I must be off. Well then, this evening, you say?... What time?” “Oh, I should think ten would be early enough. Will you come?” “Yes. I’ll try to bring Edouard, too. But you know he doesn’t much care for Passavant; and literary gatherings bore him. It would only be to see you. I say, can’t we meet somewhere after my Latin paper?” Olivier did not immediately answer. He reflected with despair that he had promised to meet Passavant that afternoon at the printer’s to talk over the printing of the _Vanguard_. What would he not have given to be free? “I should like to, but I’m engaged.” No trace of his unhappiness was apparent; and Bernard answered: “Oh, well, it doesn’t matter.” And at that the two friends parted.