294, 'GOD'S PEACE'
When I decided to break up my life in town I think, unconsciously, that my strongest motive was not only to get away from my last mistress, but still more from the love-game which is played in the surface society of the big town, and in which I so eagerly took part. I had mostly taken part in it to satisfy my desire to shame love, to tear it down from the giddy pinnacle on which my youth's blind faith had placed it, with the result that I myself one day was lying maimed on the ground.
I had loved and had been deceived. I forced my sorrow back into my own heart and swore a silent oath, that for the first and last time I had been love's fool. As I had been conquered, I would conquer now. As I had been played with, so I would play with others. I had no desire to hurt, as I had been hurt. I merely meant to take love with a high hand, as love once had taken me. And I wished to teach others to do the same, teach them that love is only worthy to be taken as a joke. Certainly not in the least a thing to stake one's life on. But I learned that in love one always stakes one 's life, even if it is not one's intention to do so. I felt my hfe was being ruined, while I believed I was preparing to be love's master. I awoke one morning in terror thinking of the years that are passing. What has become of all the loves I played with? What have I garnered of the feeUngs I carelessly sowed hither and thither ? Drop by drop I let my heart's blood ooze away. I gave little and received nothing,
