before! Artists go about the world with the great hunger of their
hearts, and expecting to find by chance another soul like the one
they have spent years in making beautiful and swift and strong; but
has anyone ever thought that instead of writing books that no one
understands, he might be making another kind of an artwork--one
that would be alive, and with sacred possibilities of its own?

XV

DEAR THYRSIS:

Your last letters have been very beautiful. I see one thing--though
you inform me that you believe you are a hard man, your natural
gentleness and sympathy of heart would be the ruin of both of us in
the future if I would permit it. But I think you can trust me, not
ever as long as I live to lead you into weakness. My desperateness,
before I received your letter saying that I might come with you, was
rather dreadful; it made me doubt myself, for it was so difficult to
keep myself from going to pieces. I have been wicked enough, to
wonder whether I could ever make you feel as I felt for two days--if
I could only bring to your heart that one pang, the only real one I
ever felt in my life! But it taught me one thing, that the only road
toward realization of life and one's self is through suffering. I
found out that I could bear, for it seems to me as I look back at
that horrible nightmare, that it was almost by a superhuman effort I
was able to read the letter at all. But enough of that!

I think I have effectually cured myself of any weak yearning for
your love. I go to you in gratefulness, knowing what I lack and what
you need. Anything my love can do for you, it shall do. It may have