And..."To stun with clatter a mind that wishes to think.""Weak as I am, in order not to let my mind fly away on every wind that blows, yielding to the slightest breath it encounters, it would be necessary either to have everything motionless around me, or else, speeding on like a humming-top, in movement itself to be rendered impervious to external things.Whenever, rotating slowly on myself, I attempt to speed up, the merest nothing—a word, a story, a newspaper, a visit—stops me, prevents my becoming a gyroscope or top, and can postpone or for ever delay the instant when, equipped with sufficient speed, I might be able to concentrate within myself in spite of what is around me.We are obliged to cat, drink, sleep, laze, love; that is to say, to touch the sweetest things in this life, and yet not succumb in doing all that, to make the anti-natural thought to which one has devoted one's self remain dominant and continue its impassable course in one's poor head. One must make of life a dream, and of that dream a reality. "
"What shall I be later on? [he wrote in his diary in 1881]. I am very rarely all under command at once; ordinarily a portion of my being is asleep. It seems to me that my mind gets clumsier every day. Before, I flung myself into scientific or other divagations; today I barely touch on subjects and do not allow myself to be absorbed by them any more. And I have so many, many things to do! Is my poor mind then, so feeble that it cannot act upon my body? Is thought itself unable to move my poor mind? Then it is worth very little! And Pride, Ambition—couldn't they at least propel me, or will they let me live like this? In my imagination I shall find most confidence to pull myself out of the rut. Imagination may perhaps entice my mind and carry it away. But I am very much afraid that imagination, too, may be dead ... "
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