I
Have Travelled From Place To Place, Plunged Into Amusements - Tried
Dissipation And Distraction Of Every Kind - All - All In Vain.
I once had recourse to my pencil as a desperate experiment.
I painted
an exact resemblance of this phantom face. I placed it before me in
hopes that by constantly contemplating the copy I might diminish the
effect of the original. But I only doubled instead of diminishing the
misery.
Such is the curse that has clung to my footsteps - that has made my life
a burthen - but the thoughts of death, terrible. God knows what I have
suffered. What days and days, and nights and nights, of sleepless
torment. What a never-dying worm has preyed upon my heart; what an
unquenchable fire has burned within my brain. He knows the wrongs that
wrought upon my poor weak nature; that converted the tenderest of
affections into the deadliest of fury. He knows best whether a frail
erring creature has expiated by long-enduring torture and measureless
remorse, the crime of a moment of madness. Often, often have I
prostrated myself in the dust, and implored that he would give me a
sign of his forgiveness, and let me die. -
Thus far had I written some time since. I had meant to leave this
record of misery and crime with you, to be read when I should be no
more. My prayer to heaven has at length been heard. You were witness to
my emotions last evening at the performance of the Miserere; when the
vaulted temple resounded with the words of atonement and redemption.
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