“Do you mean to tell me, once for all, that if your sister is willing to become my wife you absolutely make way for her, and will not entertain any thought of what I suggested to you any more?”
The example is taken from Alicia’s Diary.
Charles made a mistake: he confused tenderness and adoration for love. Being an honest man, he can’t marry Caroline, for he knows that she deserves to be loved as much as he loves and adores his Alicia. The paradox is that Alicia becomes the reason of his happiness and unhappiness at the same very time, for she refuses to marry Charles. Caroline’s wishes are Alicia’s highest priorities. She loves her sister to such an extent that if her sister “is willing to become” Charles wife, she “absolutely” makes way for her, and “will not entertain any thought of what” Charles suggested to her more. It is scary to think how willing Alicia is to sacrifice her own chance for happiness for her sister’s sake.
“I am sorry for you.”
The example is taken from A Committee-Man of 'The Terror'.
Monsieur B is responsible for death of Mademoiselle V’s father, brother, uncle – “all” her family. He “broke” her mother’s heart. The young woman says that “they had done nothing bit kept silence.” Their “sentiments” were “only guessed” and their “headless corpses” were “thrown indiscriminately into the ditch of the Mousseaux Cemetery,” and “destroyed with lime.” Mademoiselle V is left “without a friend,” a lonely foreigner in “a foreign land.” She has been thinking that Monsieur B is a heartless monster, so the young lady is taken aback when he says that he is “sorry for her.” He doesn’t pride himself in what he has done and understands what kind of pain he caused her. It takes a lot to apologize even though he doesn’t consider himself guilty.
“On reflection, much as I honour and adore you, I decide to set you free.”
The example is taken from A Committee-Man of 'The Terror'.
“As one whose life has been devoted,” and even sacrificed “to the cause of Liberty,” Monsieur B doesn’t want Mademoiselle V marry him only to suffer from remorse later. She has not even guessed that “every qualm” she has felt on the subject of their marriage has been “paralleled” in his heart “to the full.” Her “involuntary outburst of remorse yesterday” was “last item” in his own doubts “on the wisdom of their union,” giving them a force he could no longer withstand. He came home and decided to set the love of his life “free,” for Monsieur B wants her to be fully happy which can never be possible while she is with him, for the shadows of her dead relatives will forever stand between them.
