o believe, but it was of no use. Yes, these days will
indeed count in my lifetime, for if they were not the most decisive,
they were assuredly the most painful. It was a hard thing to
re-commence life from the beginning, at the age of three and twenty.
I could scarcely realise the possibility of my having to fight my way
through the motley crowd of turbulent and ambitious persons. Timid as
I am, I was ever tempted to select a plain and common-place career,
which I might have ennobled inwardly. I had lost the desire to know,
to scrutinise and to criticise; it seemed to me as if it was enough to
love and to feel; but yet I quite feel that as soon as ever the heart
throbbed more slowly, the head would once more cry out for food.

I was compelled, however, to create a fresh existence for myself in
this world so little adapted for me. I need not trouble you with an
account of these complications, which would be as uninteresting to you
as they were painful to myself. You may picture me spending whole
days in going from one person to another. I was ashamed of myself,
but necessity knows no law. Man does not live by bread alone; but he
cannot live without bread. But through it all I never ceased to keep
my eyes fixed heavenwards.

I will merely tell you that in compliance with the advice of M.
Carbon, and for another peremptory reason of which I will speak to
you later on, I thought it best to refuse several rather tempting
proposals, and to accept in the preparatory school annexed to the
Stanislas College, a humble post which in several respects harmonised
very well with my present position. This situation did not take
up more than an hour and a half of my time each day, and I had the
advantage of making use of special courses of mathematics, physics,
etc., to say nothing of preparatory lectures for the M.A. degree, one
of which was delivered twice a week, by M. Lenormant I was agreeably
surprised at finding so much frank and cordial geniality among
these young people; and I can safely say that I never had anything
approaching to a misunderstanding while there, and that I left the
school with sincere regret. But the most remarkable incident in this
period of my life were beyond all doubt my relations with M. Gratry,
the director of the college. I shall have much to tell you about him,
and I am delighted at having made his acquaintance. He is the very
miniature of M. Bautain, of whom he is the pupil and friend. We became
very