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235
The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft
·
George Gissing
152
XIV.
I
have
had
one
of
my
savage
headaches.
For
a
day
and
a
night
I
was
in
blind
torment.
Have
at
it,
now,
with
the
stoic
remedy.
Sickness
of
the
body
is
no
evil.
With
a
little
resolution
and
considering
it
as
a
natural
issue
of
certain
natural
processes,
pain
may
well
be
borne.
One's
solace
is,
to
remember
that
it
cannot
affect
the
soul,
which
partakes
of
the
eternal
nature.
This
body
is
but
as
"the
clothing,
or
the
cottage,
of
the
mind."
Let
flesh
be
racked;
I,
the
very
I,
will
stand
apart,
lord
of
myself.
Meanwhile,
memory,
reason,
every
faculty
of
my
intellectual
part,
is
being
whelmed
in
muddy
oblivion.
Is
the
soul
something
other
than
the
mind?
If
so,
I
have
lost
all
consciousness
of
its
existence.
For
me,
mind
and
soul
are
one,
and,
as
I
am
too
feelingly
reminded,
that
element
of
my
being
is
here,
where
the
brain
throbs
and
anguishes.
A
little
more
of
such
suffering,
and
I
were
myself
no
longer;
the
body
representing
me
would
gesticulate
and
rave,
but
I
should
know
nothing
of
its
motives,
its
fantasies.
The
very
I,
it
is
too
plain,
consists
but
with
a
certain
balance
of
my
physical
elements,
which
we
call
health.
Even
in
the
light
beginnings
of
my
headache,
I
was
already
not
myself;
my
thoughts
followed
no
normal
course,
and
I
was
aware
of
the
abnormality.
A
few
hours
later,
I
was
but
a
walking
disease;
my
mind--if
one
could
use
the
word--had
become
a
barrel-organ,
grinding
in
endless
repetition
a
bar
or
two
of
idle
music.
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