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There grew out of these ideas of sin, rigorous penances, most painful forms of self-torment. It was only by practices of this sort that there was hope of avoiding the retribution so much dreaded. THE BRAHMINICAL CODES. The principal of these codes is the Laws of Manu. Manu was imagined to be the first human being, conceived of as a sage.
He profoundly appeals to writers endowed with "the artistic conscience" as "the martyr of literary style." In morals something of a libertine, in matters of art he exhibited the intolerance of weakness in others and the remorseless self-examination and self-torment commonly attributed to the Puritan.
Thus, in the first place, he will be secure from inward reproaches and contests, from vacillation and self-torment.
Nothing more than that; he understood perfectly the limits of her feeling. But this could not put restraint upon the emotion with which he received any most trifling utterance of kindness from her. He did not think of what was, but of what, under changed circumstances, might be. To encourage such fantasy was the idlest self-torment, but he had gone too far in this form of indulgence.
However, he found that this delicacy, with many other painful repugnances, must at this moment be laid aside; and, without further self-torment, he consigned the money to the use for which he felt aware the countess had wished it to be applied, namely, to provide himself with an English dress. During these various reflections, he did not leave Lady Tinemouth's letter unanswered.
But another idea had taken even more powerfully possession of his mind; his thoughts darted forward like a pack of hounds on the trail, in frantic pursuit of the power which had thus passed sentence on him. This condition of lonely self-torment lasted a long while, and increased his exasperation. And then, one day, he noticed that his healthy foot was growing stiff and the ankle swelling.
He saw the trembling of the soft throat, and bent over her. "I only ask you, for both our sakes, not to test it too far!" And taking her hand by force, he crushed it passionately in his own. But she was only half appeased. Her mind, indeed, was in that miserable state when love finds its only pleasure in self-torment. With a secret change of ground she asked him how he was going to spend the day.
Among these were fine editions of Rousseau and Voltaire, which appeared to be intended for use; and we could imagine a solitary student, dark-eyed and pale, exploring their depths at midnight with a stolen candle, and endeavoring, with self-torment, to reconcile the intolerance of his doctrine with the charities of his heart.
He found some alleviation from self-torment in David Copperfield, and he determined to borrow a feather from 'the master's' pinion in other words, to place an autobiographical novel to his credit. The result was Born in Exile , one of the last of the three-volume novels, by no means one of the worst.
Through the deserted apartments, the scene of so many bitter reflections, the unhappy youth stalked like a discontented ghost, conjuring up around him at every step new subjects for sorrow and for self-torment.
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