Now, my dear good friend, farewell!  If perchance you believe that I can show you any kindness here, I need not, of course, remind you to address yourself first to

Your faithful, truly loving,

L. v.  BEETHOVEN.

NO. 45

TO COUNTESS GIULIETTA GUICCIARDI

On the 6th July, 1801, in the morning

My Angel, My All, My Very Self: 

Just a few words today, and indeed in pencil—­with thine—­only till tomorrow is my room definitely engaged; what an unworthy waste of time in such matters—­why this deep sorrow where necessity speaks!  Can our love endure otherwise than through sacrifices, through restraint in longing?  Canst thou help not being wholly mine, can I, not being wholly thine?  Oh! gaze at nature in all its beauty, and calmly accept the inevitable—­love demands everything, and rightly so. Thus is it for me with thee, for thee with me, only thou so easily forgettest that I must live for myself and for thee—­were we wholly united thou wouldst feel this painful fact as little as I should—­my journey was terrible.  I arrived here only yesterday morning at four o’clock, and as they were short of horses the mail-coach selected another route—­but what an awful road!  At the last stage but one I was warned against traveling by night; they frightened me with a wood, but that only spurred me on—­and I was wrong, the coach must needs break down, the road being dreadful, a swamp, a mere country road; without the postillions I had with me I should have stuck on the way.  Esterhazi, by the ordinary road, met with the same fate with eight horses as I with four—­yet it gave me some pleasure, as successfully overcoming any difficulty always does.  Now for a quick change from without to within—­we shall probably soon see each other, besides, today I cannot tell thee what has been passing through my mind during the past few days concerning my life—­were our hearts closely united I should not do things of this kind.  My heart is full of many things I have to say to thee—­ah, there are moments in which I feel that speech is powerless!  Cheer up—­remain my true, my only treasure, my all!!! as I to thee.  The gods must send the rest—­what for us must be and ought to be.

Thy faithful

LUDWIG.

Monday Evening, July 6.

Thou sufferest, thou my dearest love!  I have just found out that the letters must be posted very early Mondays, Thursdays—­the only days when the post goes from here to K. Thou sufferest—­ah, where I am, art thou also with me!  I will arrange for myself and Thee; I will manage so that I can live with thee; and what a life!!!  But as it is—­without thee!!!  Persecuted here and there by the kindness of men, which I little deserve, and as little care to deserve.  Humility of man toward man—­it pains me—­and when I think of myself in connection