was quite lifted out of myself, by a conviction that came like a
benediction, that the essence of my soul was good and pure, and that
if anybody upon earth had the power to reach God, it was myself.

Dear God, _how_ I have spent the years of my life! like an imbecile!
But you--if you take me, I shall go mad--I shall love you like a
tigress! I shall implore you to invent any way that will enable me
to realize life! Oh, if you take me, how madly I shall love you! I
fancy myself seeing you now, and I don't know what I should do--I
love you so dreadfully! I think of you, and everything about you
seems so wondrously beautiful to me!

I almost have a feeling that I have no right to love you so much.
Oh, tell me, do you want me to love you as I can? Already you seem
part of me, mine--mine! And it is wonderful how you help me.

XXIV

Thyrsis:

I spent the whole day in the park without a bite to eat, because I
did not want to take the trouble to come home after it, and I only
had five cents. I have tried, oh, tried to control myself and make
myself saner. I am seized with occasional fits of the horrors, and
of wild cravings for you, until I could scream. It is so unbearable,
and I almost want to die. Oh, but I do _not_ want to die! My
imagination has become so fevered in the last few days--if I do not
see you soon, I know not what will become of me!

I have never loved you so wildly--though I have always longed for