What should I do among these many experienced financial speculators?  I am only a poor sparrow, born among the housetops, and should always fear the enemy crouching in the dark corner; I am a prudent workman, and should think of the business of my neighbors who so suddenly disappeared; I am a timid observer, and should call to mind the flowers so slowly raised by the old soldier, or the shop brought to ruin by constant change of masters.  Away from me, ye banquets, over which hangs the sword of Damocles!  I am a country mouse.  Give me my nuts and hollow tree, and I ask nothing besides—­except security.

And why this insatiable craving for riches?  Does a man drink more when he drinks from a large glass?  Whence comes that universal dread of mediocrity, the fruitful mother of peace and liberty?  Ah! there is the evil which, above every other, it should be the aim of both public and private education to anticipate!  If that were got rid of, what treasons would be spared, what baseness avoided, what a chain of excess and crime would be forever broken!  We award the palm to charity, and to self-sacrifice; but, above all, let us award it to moderation, for it is the great social virtue.  Even when it does not create the others, it stands instead of them.

Six o’clock.—­I have written a letter of thanks to the promoters of the new speculation, and have declined their offer!  This decision has restored my peace of mind.  I stopped singing, like the cobbler, as long as I entertained the hope of riches:  it is gone, and happiness is come back!

O beloved and gentle Poverty! pardon me for having for a moment wished to fly from thee, as I would from Want.  Stay here forever with thy charming sisters, Pity, Patience, Sobriety, and Solitude; be ye my queens and my instructors; teach me the stern duties of life; remove far from my abode the weakness of heart and giddiness of head which follow prosperity.  Holy Poverty! teach me to endure without complaining, to impart without grudging, to seek the end of life higher than in pleasure, farther off than in power.  Thou givest the body strength, thou makest the mind more firm; and, thanks to thee, this life, to which the rich attach themselves as to a rock, becomes a bark of which death may cut the cable without awakening all our fears.  Continue to sustain me, O thou whom Christ hath called Blessed!

CHAPTER IV

LET US LOVE ONE ANOTHER

April 9th

The fine evenings are come back; the trees begin to put forth their shoots; hyacinths, jonquils, violets, and lilacs perfume the baskets of the flower-girls—­all the world have begun their walks again on the quays and boulevards.  After dinner, I, too, descend from my attic to breathe the evening air.