483ページ中62ページ

I knew well therefore what would be my father's feelings, but I

could not tear my thoughts from my employment, loathsome in

itself, but which had taken an irresistible hold of my

imagination. I wished, as it were, to procrastinate all that

related to my feelings of affection until the great object, which

swallowed up every habit of my nature, should be completed.

I then thought that my father would be unjust if he ascribed my

neglect to vice or faultiness on my part, but I am now convinced

that he was justified in conceiving that I should not be

altogether free from blame. A human being in perfection ought

always to preserve a calm and peaceful mind and never to allow

passion or a transitory desire to disturb his tranquillity. I do

not think that the pursuit of knowledge is an exception to this

rule. If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to

weaken your affections and to destroy your taste for those simple

pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is

certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind.