Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete

te shirt front, in which gold and jewelled studs glistened, and were looking at the boxes full of ladies in low dresses covered with diamonds and pearls, who were expanding like flowers

on of real or false charms, of jewels, of luxury and of pretension which displayed itself in all pa

iful the Comtesse de

ung, and her striking beauty seemed to attract all eyes in every corner of the house. Her pale complexion, of an ivory ti

Grandin replied with a jocular accent of sincer

o you thin

since she was a child and I saw her make her debut into socie

ossi

sure o

ks twent

had seven

incre

. I occasionally go to the house, which is a very quiet and pleasant one,

have there never been

ev

r husband? He is p

en them, one of those little domestic dramas which one suspe

t is

d spouse he had a shocking temper, was crabbed and easily took offence, but since he has been leading his present wild life he h

or perhaps physical antipathies, which were not perceived at first, give rise to in families, and then Roger de Salnis, who was still

she refused to have any more, in order to take her place

r wo

you pi

ll her youth, all her beauty, every hope of success, every poetical ideal of a brilliant life sacrificed to that ab

ou have? It i

pitude. He seems to have made them only in order that they may reproduce their species in an ignoble manner and then die like ephemeral insects. I said reproduce their species in an ignoble manner and I adhere to that expression. What is there as a matter of fact more ignoble and more repugnant than that act of reproduction of living beings, against which all delicate minds always have revolted and always will revolt? Since all the organs which have been invented by this economical and malicious Creator serve two purposes, why did He not choose another method of performing that sacred mission, which is the noblest and the most exalted of all human functions? The mouth, which nourishes the body by means of material food, also diffuses abroad speech and thought. Our flesh renews itself of its own accord, while we are thinking about it. Th

hildren just like an animal

uch a pearl, born to be beautiful, admired, feted and adored, has spent

ere is a great deal of truth in all that,

nd is ignorant of the combinations of all kinds which are produced by His scattered germs. The human mind is a lucky little local, passing accident which was totally unforeseen, and condemned to disappear with this earth and to recommence perhaps here or elsewhere the same or different with fresh combinations of eternally new beginnings. We owe it to this little lapse

surprising outbursts of his imagination, asked him: "Then you believe t

to new mixtures and similar also to a charge of electricity, caused by friction or the unexpected proximity o

-so different from mere animal thought and resignation-would the world which was created to receive the beings which we now are have been this unpleasant little park for small game, this salad patch, this wooded, rocky and sph

we are. Thought, which is developed by a miracle in the nerves of the cells in our brain, powerless, ignorant and confuse

to eat or go hunting and eat each other, according to their instincts, for God never foresaw gentleness and peaceable manners; He only foresaw the death of creatures which were bent on destroying and devouring each other. Are not the quail, the pig

have discovered and made everything, beginning with houses, then exquisite food, sauces, sweetmeats, pastry, drink, stuffs, clothes, ornaments, beds, mattresses, carriages, railways and innumerable machines, besides arts a

n to eternal fate, intelligible to our minds alone, a sensual and intellectual distraction,

she not better as she is? But, speaking of her, does any one know why and how her brute of a husband, having such a companion by his s

that raising a family was becoming too expensive, and from reasons of domestic ec

third act, and they turned round,