Quotation from: Villette

Written by: Charlotte Bronte


My heart almost died within me; miserable longings strained its
chords. How long were the September days! How silent, how lifeless!
How vast and void seemed the desolate premises! How gloomy the
forsaken garden--grey now with the dust of a town summer departed.
Looking forward at the commencement of those eight weeks, I hardly
knew how I was to live to the end. My spirits had long been gradually
sinking; now that the prop of employment was withdrawn, they went down
fast. Even to look forward was not to hope: the dumb future spoke no
comfort, offered no promise, gave no inducement to bear present evil
in reliance on future good. A sorrowful indifference to existence
often pressed on me--a despairing resignation to reach betimes the end
of all things earthly. Alas! When I had full leisure to look on life
as life must be looked on by such as me, I found it but a hopeless
desert: tawny sands, with no green fields, no palm-tree, no well in
view. The hopes which are dear to youth, which bear it up and lead it
on, I knew not and dared not know. If they knocked at my heart
sometimes, an inhospitable bar to admission must be inwardly drawn.
When they turned away thus rejected, tears sad enough sometimes
flowed: but it could not be helped: I dared not give such guests
lodging. So mortally did I fear the sin and weakness of presumption.

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