He was less philosophical on the morrow, and, in a moment of ill-humor, gave himself this alternative which had for an instant occupied him the evening before: Either he would be completely disinterested in Sixtine, or he would become her lover within twenty-four hours. "I cannot play the rôle of a companion to Moscowitch, I cannot admit such a possibility in my life--he or I. What! will those dear arms I have clasped around my neck in dreams caress the Austrian beard of this dramatist? I do not even wish to give expression to my jealousy: in himself, Moscowitch is only another person. Thus, shall another person have those lips and eyes and hair? Vulgar plaints of a vulgar jealous person: to what details do I apply my imagination? How the obscene image possesses me! So one must come to this point, and that is why I love her--for that alone! Bravo! words are useful: with words one analyzes everything, one destroys and sullies everything. Since it is this, I no longer wish it. Valentine plays the beast prettily, and what more do I want! She is sly as a succuba and charming in her ways, and what more do I want! Her caresses have a profuse generosity: her heart is on her hand and on her lips, and what more do I want!" He took a walk, despite the cold, through the bare and muddy alleys of the Luxembourg, among the shivering statues and silent trees. "If desire," he thought once more, "permits me--even in thought--the freedom of choice, what is the good of loving, or do I really and truly love? I would perhaps need, like a woman, possession to free me of my doubts. I am afraid lest, after its first blossoming, my temperament grow effeminate and give way, corroded by the rust of a devouring indecision. After my ideas, I analyze my sentiments: the air is becoming unbreathable. I thought that a passion would have refashioned the synthesis of my will; it is too late--the elements, dispersed, have become irreconcilable; here I am, approaching the state of a fakir who, with arms uplifted to an empty sky, immobile and with feet firmly pressed against the ground, dreams of the life he will no longer live. Thinking is not living; living is feeling. Where am I? I wished to penetrate the essence of each thing; I saw that there was nothing but movement, and the world, reduced to an indivisible force, vanished: I expected to double my sensations by dividing them, and I have seen them annihilated. There is nothing worth the lifting of a finger tip: one's reason reduces everything to a vague stirring of cerebral atoms, to a little inward bluster." As he whispered in the gloomy silence of the vast garden, the words took flight, leaving only a murmuring trace of their passage. It required an effort for him to reseize the logic of his complaints: