To Think Is To Be Full of SorrowThe grotesque character of everyday occurrences conceals fromone the real misery of passions.

　　BARNAVEWhile he was replacing its ordinary furniture in the room that M. deLa Mole had occupied, Julien found a piece of stout paper, folded twiceacross. He read at the foot of the first page:

　　To H. E., M. le Marquis de La Mole, Peer of France, Knight of the Royal Orders, etc., etc.

　　It was a petition in the rude handwriting of a cook.

　　Monsieur le Marquis,All my life I have held religious principles. I was in Lyons, exposed tothe bombs, at the time of the siege, in '93, of execrable memory. I am acommunicant, I go every Sunday to mass in my parish church. I havenever failed in my Easter duty, not even in '93, of execrable memory. Mycook, for before the revolution I kept servants, my cook observes Friday.

　　I enjoy in Verrieres a general and I venture to say merited respect. I walkbeneath the dais in processions, beside the cure and the mayor. I carry,on solemn occasions, a big candle bought at my own cost. The certificatesof all of which are in Paris at the Ministry of Finance. I ask Monsieur leMarquis for the Verrieres lottery office, which cannot fail to be vacantsoon in one way or another, the present holder being seriously ill, andbesides voting the wrong way at the elections; etc.

　　DE CHOLINOn the margin of this petition was an endorsement signed de Moirod,which began with the words:

　　'I had the honour yesterday to mention the respectable person whomakes this request,' and so forth.

　　 'And so even that imbecile Cholin shows me the way that I must follow,' Julien said to himself.

　　A week after the visit of the King of —— to Verrieres, the chief thingto emerge from the innumerable falsehoods, foolish interpretations, absurd discussions, etc., etc., to which the King, the Bishop of Agde, theMarquis de La Mole, the ten thousand bottles of wine, the unseatedMoirod (who, in the hope of a Cross, did not set foot outside his owndoor for a whole month after his fall) were in turn subjected, was the utter indelicacy of having jockeyed into the Guard of Honour, Julien Sorel,the son of a carpenter. You ought to have heard, on this topic, thewealthy calico printers, who, morning, noon and night, used to talkthemselves hoarse in preaching equality. That proud woman, Madamede Renal, was the author of this abomination. Her reason? The flashingeyes and pink cheeks of that young abbe Sorel were reason enough andto spare.

　　Shortly after their return to Vergy, Stanislas Xavier, the youngest ofthe children, took fever; at once Madame de Renal was seized by themost fearful remorse. For the first time she blamed herself for falling inlove in a coherent fashion. She seemed to understand, as though by amiracle, the appalling sin into which she had let herself be drawn. Although deeply religious by nature, until this moment she had neverthought of the magnitude of her crime in the eyes of God.

　　Long ago, at the convent of the Sacred Heart, she had loved God witha passionate love; she feared Him in the same way in this predicament.

　　The struggles that rent her heart asunder were all the more terrible inthat there was nothing reasonable in her fear. Julien discovered that anyrecourse to argument irritated instead of calming her; she saw in it thelanguage of hell. However, as Julien himself was greatly attached to littleStanislas, he was more welcome to speak to her of the child's illness:

　　presently it assumed a grave character. Then her incessant remorse deprived Madame de Renal even of the power to sleep; she never emergedfrom a grim silence: had she opened her mouth, it would have been toconfess her crime to God and before men.

　　'I beg of you,' Julien said to her, as soon as they were alone, 'say nothing to anyone; let me be the sole confidant of your griefs. If you still loveme, do not speak! your words cannot cure our Stanislas of his fever.'

　　But his attempts at consolation produced no effect; he did not knowthat Madame de Renal had taken it into her head that, to appease the anger of a jealous God, she must either hate Julien or see her son die. It was because she felt that she could not hate her lover that she was sounhappy.

　　'Avoid my presence,' she said to Julien one day; 'in the name of God,leave this house: it is your presence here that is killing my son.

　　'God is punishing me,' she added in a whisper; 'He is just; I adore Hisequity; my crime is shocking, and I was living without remorse! It wasthe first sign of departure from God: I ought to be doubly punished.'

　　Julien was deeply touched. He was unable to see in this attitude eitherhypocrisy or exaggeration. 'She believes that she is killing her son by loving me, and yet the unhappy woman loves me more than her son. That,how can I doubt it, is the remorse that is killing her; there is true nobilityof feeling. But how can I have inspired such love, I, so poor, so ill-bred,so ignorant, often so rude in my manners?'

　　One night the child's condition was critical. About two o'clock in themorning, M. de Renal came to see him. The boy, burning with fever, wasextremely flushed and did not recognise his father. Suddenly Madamede Renal threw herself at her husband's feet: Julien saw that she was going to reveal everything and to ruin herself for ever.

　　Fortunately, this strange exhibition annoyed M. de Renal.

　　'Good night! Good night!' he said and prepared to leave the room.

　　'No, listen to me,' cried his wife on her knees before him, seeking tohold him back. 'Learn the whole truth. It is I that am killing my son. Igave him his life, and I am taking it from him. Heaven is punishing me;in the eyes of God, I am guilty of murder. I must destroy and humblemyself; it may be that such a sacrifice will appease the Lord.'

　　If M. de Renal had been a man of imagination, he would have guessedeverything.

　　'Romantic stuff,' he exclaimed, thrusting away his wife who sought toembrace his knees. 'Romantic stuff, all that! Julien, tell them to fetch thedoctor at daybreak.'

　　And he went back to bed. Madame de Renal sank on her knees, halfunconscious, with a convulsive movement thrusting away Julien, whowas coming to her assistance.

　　Julien stood watching her with amazement.

　　'So this is adultery!' he said to himself … 'Can it be possible that thoserascally priests are right after all? That they, who commit so many sins,have the privilege of knowing the true theory of sin? How very odd!'

　　 For twenty minutes since M. de Renal had left the room, Julien hadseen the woman he loved, her head sunk on the child's little bed, motionless and almost unconscious. 'Here we have a woman of superior intelligence reduced to the last extremes of misery, because she has knownme,' he said to himself.

　　The hours passed rapidly. 'What can I do for her? I must make up mymind. I have ceased to count here. What do I care for men, and their sillyaffectations? What can I do for her? … Go from her? But I shall be leaving her alone, torn by the most frightful grief. That automaton of a husband does her more harm than good. He will say something offensive toher, in his natural coarseness; she may go mad, throw herself from thewindow.

　　'If I leave her, if I cease to watch over her, she will tell him everything.

　　And then, for all one knows, in spite of the fortune he is to inheritthrough her, he will make a scandal. She may tell everything, great God,to that—abbe Maslon, who makes the illness of a child of six an excusefor never stirring out of this house, and not without purpose. In her griefand her fear of God, she forgets all that she knows of the man; she seesonly the priest.'

　　'Leave me,' came suddenly from Madame de Renal as she opened hereyes.

　　'I would give my life a thousand times to know how I can be of mostuse to you,' replied Julien; 'never have I so loved you, my dear angel, orrather, from this instant only, I begin to adore you as you deserve to beadored. What is to become of me apart from you, and with the knowledge that you are wretched by my fault! But I must not speak of myown sufferings. I shall go, yes, my love. But, if I leave you, if I cease towatch over you, to be constantly interposing myself between you andyour husband, you will tell him everything, you will be ruined. Think ofthe ignominy with which he will drive you from the house; all Verrieres,all Besancon will ring with the scandal. All the blame will be cast on you;you will never be able to lif............