e is also another reason. If
this state of things does not exactly answer to my expectations, it
pleases and conciliates Aniela. She fancies I love her in a nobler
way, therefore she appreciates, I dare not say loves, me more and
more. In spite of the absence of all outward signs, I see it and it
gives me courage; I say to myself, "If her feeling increases, only
persevere, and a time may come when it will be stronger than her power
of resistance."

People generally, and women especially, fancy that the so-called
Platonic love is a peculiar species of love, very rare and very noble.
It is simply a confusion of ideas. There may be such a thing as
Platonic relations, but Platonic love is as much nonsense as dark
light. Even love for the dead consists of a longing after their bodily
presence as well as their souls. Among the living this feeling is
called resignation.

I did not want to say an untruth when I told Aniela I would love her
as if she were dead; but resignation does not exclude all hope. In
spite of all my disappointments, in spite of the consciousness that my
hopes are vain, I still nourish in a corner of my heart the hope that
the present state of affairs is only a halting-place on the way
to love. I may repeat to myself over and over again, "Delusion!
delusion!" but I cannot get rid of it until I get rid of my desire.
They are inseparable. I agreed to the compact because I could not help
myself, because I preferred this to nothing at all; but I consider it,
almost unconsciously, as a diplomatic move which aims at complete, not
half happiness. What makes me nevertheless thoughtful, surprises, and
grieves me, and what I simply cannot understand, is that on this line
even I am defeated. My victories lie in the dim, far-off future; but
in the present, in spite of all my cunning, experience of life, strong
feelings, and diplomacy, I am defeated by a being infinitely more
simple than I, less skilled in life's tactics, less cautious and
calculating in the course she takes. It is a defeat; there is no other
word for it. What is our present relation? Nothing more than the
relation of brother and sister, which she wished for and which I did
not wish. Formerly I fought with the storm and often came to grief,
but I steered my own bark. Now Aniela steers for us both; we go more
smoothly and more evenly, but I feel I am going where I did not wish
to go. I now understand why she put out her hand at once, when I
mentioned