I thought I should punish you too little by merely breaking with you, and

that my ceasing to love you would give you but a slight concern, after

you had first forsaken me; I found it was necessary you should love me,

to feel the smart of not being loved, which I so severely experienced

myself; I was of opinion that if anything could rekindle that flame, it

would be to let you see that mine was extinguished, but to let you see

it through an endeavour to conceal it from you, as if I wanted the

power to acknowledge it to you: this resolution I adhered to; I found

it difficult to take, and when I saw you again I thought it impossible

to execute. I was ready a hundred times to break out into tears and

complaints; my ill state of health, which still continued, served as a

disguise to hide from you the affliction and trouble I was in;

afterward I was supported by the pleasure of dissembling with you, as

you had done with me; however it was doing so apparent a violence to

myself to tell you or to write to you that I loved you, that you

immediately perceived I had no mind to let you see my affection was

altered; you was touched with this, you complained of it; I endeavoured

to remove your fears, but it was done in so forced a manner, that you

were still more convinced by it, I no longer loved you; in short, I did

all I intended to do.

The fantasticalness of your heart was such, that

you advanced towards me in proportion as you saw I retreated from you.

I have enjoyed all the pleasure which can arise from revenge; I plainly

saw, that you loved me more than you had ever done, and I showed you I

had no longer any love for you. I had even reason to believe that you

had entirely abandoned her, for whom you had forsaken me; I had ground

too to be satisfied you had never spoken to her concerning me; but

neither your discretion in that particular, nor the return of your

affection can make amends for your inconstancy; your heart has been

divided between me and another, and you have deceived me; this is

sufficient wholly to take from me the pleasure I found in being loved

by you, as I thought I deserved to be, and to confirm me in the

resolution I have taken never to see you more, which you are so much

surprised at.

Madam de Cleves read this letter, and read it over again several times,

without knowing at the same time what she had read; she saw only that

the Duke de Nemours did not love her as she imagined and that he loved

others who were no less deceived by him than she. What a discovery was

this for a person in her condition, who had a violent passion, who had

just given marks of it to a man whom she judged unworthy of it, and to

another whom she used ill for his sake! Never was affliction so

cutting as hers; she imputed the piercingness of it to what had

happened that day, and believed that if the Duke de Nemours had not had

ground to believe she loved him she should not have cared whether he

loved another or not; but she deceived herself, and this evil which she

found so insupportable was jealousy with all the horrors it can be

accompanied with.




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