Benjamin Constant

you have suffered, and my ardent desire to see you reconquer what

ought to be yours by right. I said to myself: with such talents it is

never too late; with that goodness of heart, that delicacy of a

conscience so keenly aware of the suffering it is causing, with that

sensibility sharpened by the power of thought—whereas in other

people it is only diminished—it may still be possible to be loved

and enjoy being loved.^19

In his earlier letter Constant had told her that the thought of death which

had always obsessed him prevented him from making the most of his life

and abilities. He now replied to Rosalie on 17 July:

What you say about Adolphe gives me great pleasure. I think there

is a measure of truth in the details and observations in the book.

But I’ve never thought it a very important work, and it was written

ten years ago. I only published it so as not to have to read it aloud

any more, as I had fifty times in France. Since some English

visitors had heard it in Paris, I was asked to read it in London, and

after having given four readings in a week, I thought it would be

better if people took the trouble to read the novel for themselves.^20

With Adolphe out of the way, Constant was getting on with what really

mattered to him, the Memoirs concerning the Hundred Days, written in

the form of letters, as well, of course, as his work on religion. He added:

I would like to believe that I have as bright a future before me as

you describe, but my heart is little inclined to hope, and I find

looking on the black side more tolerable at the moment. If that need

to write which people call talent didn’t force me to work, I would

tend towards complete inactivity. But since nothing in everyday life

inspires the slightest interest in me, and since I’m permanently ill at

ease, I’m obliged to keep busy, just as a sick man keeps taking his

medicines.^21

It was in such a state of mind that he returned to Paris on 27 September

1816, having decided that any long-term stay in England, where the cost

of living was relatively very high, was out of the question. During October

he and Charlotte took a rented apartment in the Hôtel Vauban, and at the

urging of Germaine de Staël he set about writing a pamphlet which—with
his usual taste for long titles—he called A Political Doctrine which would

bring together All the Parties in France. It was published in December

Adolphe 235