O Liberty! Thou art always in chains, but they are not the heavy
fetters of the past; for each struggle has enlarged thy prison. Who
can tell? Perhaps later, when the prison walls have been thrown down....
But in the meanwhile, those whom thou wouldst save resist thee.
Thou art called the Public Enemy, or The One against All. To think
that this nickname should have been fastened on the weak, ordinary
Clerambault! But he did not remember that at this moment, his thoughts
were filled with the one who has always existed, ever since man has
been known on the earth; the one who has never ceased to fight their
follies, that they may be delivered--_The One whom All oppose_.... How
many times throughout the ages have they rejected and crushed him! But
in the midst of his agony a supernatural joy sustains him; he is the
sacred golden seed of liberty, which fell from we know not what sheaf,
and in the darkness of destiny has sowed the germs of light, ever
since the first chaos. In the depths of the savage heart of man, the
frail atom found shelter, it fought against elementary laws which
grind and bend living things; but tirelessly the small golden seed
grew, and man the weakest of all creatures, marched against nature and
fought her. Each step cost a drop of his blood, in this gigantic duel;
he has had to fight nature not only in the world without, but within
himself, since he is a part of her.
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