MS-WU-MSS008-3-50-2

[2788] That a man like me, so meticulous and calm in the main, so patiently
turned towards the outer world as towards the lesser evil, creature of his
house, of his garden, of his few poor possessions, discharging faithfully
and ably a revolting function, reining back his thoughts within the
limits of the calculable so great is his horror of fancy, that a man so
contrived, for I was a contrivance, should let himself be haunted and
possessed by chimeras, this ought to have seemed strange to me, ^{[place = margin right] [₰]} and been
a warning to me to have a care, in my own interest. [2789] Nothing of the kind.

[2790] I saw it only as the wea ^{[place = overwritten] a}kness of a solitary, a weakness admittedly to be
deplored, but which had to be indulged in if I wished to remain a solitary,
and I did, I clung to that, with as little enthusiasm as to my hens or to
my faith, but no less lucidly. [2791] Besides this took up very little room in
the inenarrable contraption I called my life, jeopardized it as little as
my dreams and was as soon forgotten.

[2792] Don't wait to be hunted to hide,
that was always my motto. [2793] And if I had to tell the story of my life I
should not so much as allude to these apparitions, and least of all to ^{[place = supralinear] that of} the
unfortunate Molloy. [2794] For his was a poor thing, compared to others.

[2795] But images of this kind the will cannot revive without doing them
violence. [2796] Much of what they had it takes away, much they never had it
foists upon them. [2797] And the Molloy I brought to light, at this ^{[place = supralinear] that} memorable
August Sunday, was certainly not the true denizen of my dark places, for
it was not his hour. [2798] But so far as the essential features were concerned,
I was easy in my mind, the likeness was there.

[2799] And the discrepancy could
have been still greater for all I cal ^{[place = overwritten] r}ed. [2800] For what I was doing I was doing
neither for Molloy, who mattered nothing to me, nor for myself, of whom I
despaired, but on behalf of a cause which, while having need of us to be
accomplished, was in its essence anonymous, and would live on ^{[place = supralinear] subsist}, haunting
the minds of men, when its miserable artisans w ^{[place = overwritten] s}hould be no more. [2801] It will