Diego monologue (Act 2) — Ariadne in Mantua: A Romance in Five Acts

Do not tempt me, Madam! Oh God, I do not want your pity, your loving kindness! What are such things to me? And as to understanding my sorrows, no one can, save the very one who is inflicting them. Besides, you and I call different things by the same names. What you call _love_, to me means nothing: nonsense taught to children, priest's metaphysics. What _I_ mean, you do not know. (_A pause_, DIEGO _walks up and down in agitation_.) But woe's me! You have awakened the power of breaking through this silence,--this silence which is starvation and deathly thirst and suffocation. And it so happens that if I speak to you all will be wrecked. (_A pause_.) But there remains nothing to wreck! Understand me, Madam, I care not who you are. I know that once I have spoken, you _must_ become my enemy. But I am grateful to you; you have shown me the way to speaking; and, no matter now to whom, I now _must_ speak.