The Journal of a Disappointed Man

Still thinking of suicide. It seems the only way out. This morning my Essay was returned by the Editor of ----. One by one I have been divested of all my most cherished illusions. Once my ambitions gave me the fuel with which to keep myself alive. One after another they have been foiled, and now I've nothing to burn. I am daily facing the fact that my ambitions have overtaxed my abilities and health. For years, my whole existence has rested on a false estimate of my own value, and my life been revolving around a foolish self-deception. But I know myself as I am at last--and am not at all enamoured. The future has nothing for me. I am wearied of my life already. What is there for any of us to do but die? November 14. Before going over to-night bought London Opinion deliberately in order to find a joke or better still some cynicism about women to fire off at her. Rehearsed one joke, one witticism from Oscar Wilde, and one personal anecdote (the latter for the most part false), none of which came off, tho' I succeeded in carrying off a nonchalant or even jaunty bearing. "Don't you ever swear?" I asked. "It's a good thing you know, swearing is like pimples, better to come out, cleanses the moral system. The person who controls himself must have lots of terrible oaths circulating in his blood." "Swearing is not the only remedy." "I suppose you prefer the gilded pill of a curate's sermon: I prefer pimples to pills."