BR TO OTTOLINE MORRELL, [29 MAY 1911]
BRACERS 17167. ALS. Morrell papers #93, Texas. SLBR 1: #170
Edited by N. Griffin. Proofread by K. Blackwell et al.

<letterhead>
Seventeen,
Carlyle Square
Chelsea, S.W.1^, 2
Monday mg.

My Dearest Life

It was a comfort to get a letter from you again after the Sunday blank. But I am very sorry my letters gave you the impression that they did. You must be very tired to have got that impression. As for things like being watched, they don’t worry me as much as mud on my collar would — they rather amuse me, and they relieve the moral tension by making things frankly a contest. And as for worry and anxiety, you don’t know how preferable they are to blank misery. I really rather enjoy storms and anxieties, only I don’t find it easy to bear the thought of parting from you. If they involved anything short of that, I should find them pleasant. I am sometimes dumb about love, but those are not the times when I feel least — I don’t quite know what makes me dumb — I want your letters more at these times than at any others. Now I will make up an exact statement, and please keep it in mind however dumb I may be, because it is at all times true.

1. I want to keep you and I want not to ruin your life. I want both equally — I can’t honestly say that I want one more than the other, tho’ I should choose rightly if the choice were necessary. Compared to these two, all other things in life are trivial to me. Don’t doubt this.

2. I want to accomplish, during my life, a good deal more work in philosophy, of which I already have the idea in germ. But I am no longer quite young, and I have spent a great deal of energy on the big book now printing, so that it will be uncertain whether I shall have enough energy left for another big job. I can however do a good deal in any case.

3. I want to write general things on religion and morals and popular philosophy. I could do this even if I were discredited, because I could publish anonymously. I can imagine a sermon on Strife, on the lines of what I wrote to you about the river3 — and innumerable things of that sort.

4. I like teaching, but that is inessential.a

I have put these 4b in order of importance, the most important first.

There are certain things you must clearly realize. First: Whatever may be involved in our holding to each other, the harm to me will be less than if we parted. I believe seriously that the spring of life would be broken in me if we parted now. I have been very active, and have no longer the inexhaustible energy of youth — to begin all over again would not be easy. What I should do would be to settle down to try and write the sort of religious things we have talked of — if I succeeded, I should pull through; but I fear hatred of Alys would prevent me from succeeding. Already, whenever I am not on the watch, my imagination is busy concocting letters to her which would be calculated to make her life unbearable, and would probably succeed. They flash before me in a moment, before I know what I am doing.

I thoroughly realize that this is base, and I am trying to cope with it. Of course if she settles down there will be no difficulty.

As far as I am concerned, everything is simple. Both my happiness and my work are bound up with you, whatever may be the cost of our keeping to each other. As for you, I think you may be forced to choose between Philip and me, if the Smiths persist. I believe then it would be for your good to sacrifice me, and I should do my best both at the time and afterwards to make that course not too painful to you. But if you think it would not be me whom you would sacrifice, I should be glad to know it. Of course but for the conventions you could remain friends with P. whatever happened. I feel there is no conflict between P and me — we both want your good. I could now, if he wished it, talk with him just as dispassionately as if I were in no way involved.

Dearest, you may really count on me always to tell you the exact truth, even if it would hurt cruelly. That is why I wrote what I did about Cambridge4 — I had no further thought except that I had said something rather different and felt I must correct it. But you must know once for all that life holds nothing for me that compares with you for one instant — my good, which you wish, is you. If I have you, there are other goods that may be added; if I don’t have you, there are no other goods. You must not doubt this when I don’t say it. It is the fundamental point from which everything else starts. But I shall not fail in truth. At all times I care for it greatly, and where I love, I care for it most. You shall have always the cold steel that has been tempered in the fire. The knowledge of the hurt to you, if I ever had anything painful to say, would make it more cold — but you would know what passion could alone produce it.

O my heart I ache for you. I feel as if I could hardly live through the joy of your kiss tomorrow. I have never imagined such love. I have had the feeling too that I ought to keep it back from you, so as not to interfere with your freedom — but I can’t do it. Only you know I want you to decide freely and calmly and as you think right. But you must not imagine that worries or public disgrace or anything could weigh on my side as anything compared to you. That you must remember once for all. O my life, I long for tomorrow as I never longed before. With you there is life and joy and peace and all good things — away from you there is turmoil and anguish and blank despair if we must part. Goodbye my Light and my Life.

Your
B.

• 1

  [document] Document 000093. Proofread against a colour scan of the original.

• 2

  [envelope] A circled “93”.

• 3

  I wrote to you about the river This may well be a reference to an earlier letter in which he had compared the tranquility of the Thames to human life, “a vast purposeless chaotic struggle” (#27 May, ??).

• 4

  That is why I wrote what I did about Cambridge In the letter of 26 May, in which he had explained how much Cambridge meant to him.

Textual Notes

• a

  4. I like teaching, but that is inessential. The fourth was squeezed in as an afterthought

• b

  4 written over 3