Jean-Christophe; Jean-Christophe in Paris the Market-Place. Antoinette. the House Volume 2 - Romain Rolland

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1911 edition. Excerpt: ...yet innocent sensuality any sacrifice is easy. Love made Antoinette the prey of sisterly devotion. Her brother was less passionate and had no such stay. Besides, the sacrifice was made for him, it was not he who was sacrificed--which is so much easier and sweeter when one loves. He was weighed down with remorse at seeing his sister wearing herself out for him. He would tell her so, and she would reply: "Ah! My dear!... But don't you see that that is what keeps me going? Without you to trouble me, what should I have to live for?" He understood. He, too, in Antoinette's position, would have been jealous of the trouble he caused her: but to be the cause of it!... That hurt his pride and his affection. And what a burden it was for so weak a creature to bear such a responsibility, to be bound to succeed, since on his success his sister had staked her whole life! The thought of it was intolerable to him, and, instead of spurring him on, there were times when it robbed him of all energy. And yet she forced him to struggle on, to work, to live, as he never would have done without her aid and insistence. He had a natural predisposition towards depression, --perhaps even towards suicide: --perhaps he would have succumbed to it had not his sister wished him to be ambitious and happy. He suffered from the contradiction of his nature: and yet it worked his salvation. He, too, was passing through a critical age, that fearful period when thousands of young men succumb, and give themselves up to the aberrations of their minds and senses, and for two or three years' folly spoil their lives beyond repair. If he had had time to yield to his thoughts he would have fallen into discouragement or perhaps taken to dissipation: always when he turned in upon himself he...