First Part Chapter 19

Mme. de Mirbel is painting my portrait, and I intend to give it to
him, my dear. What surprises me more and more every day is the
animation which love puts into life. How full of interest is every
hour, every action, every trifle! and what amazing confusion between
the past, the future, and the present! One lives in three tenses at
once. Is it still so after the heights of happiness are reached? Oh!
tell me, I implore you, what is happiness? Does it soothe, or does it
excite? I am horribly restless; I seem to have lost all my bearings; a
force in my heart drags me to him, spite of reason and spite of
propriety. There is this gain, that I am better able to enter into
your feelings.

Felipe's happiness consists in feeling himself mine; the aloofness of
his love, his strict obedience, irritate me, just as his attitude of
profound respect provoked me when he was only my Spanish master. I am
tempted to cry out to him as he passes, "Fool, if you love me so much
as a picture, what will it be when you know the real me?"

Oh! Renee, you burn my letters, don't you? I will burn yours. If other
eyes than ours were to read these thoughts which pass from heart to
heart, I should send Felipe to put them out, and perhaps to kill the
owners, by way of additional security. Monday.