An exhilaration relapsing into melancholy, because it was artificial, was what I also quite differently from Mme de Guermantes, felt once I had finally left her house, in the carriage that was to take me to that of M. de Charlus. We can as we choose abandon ourselves to one or other of two forces, of which one rises in ourselves, emanates from our deepest impressions, while the other comes to us from without. The first brings with it naturally a joy, the joy that springs from the life of those who create. The other current, that which endeavours to introduce into us the impulses by which persons external to ourselves are stirred, is not accomplished by pleasure; but we can add a pleasure to it, by a sort of recoil, in an intoxication so artificial that it turns swiftly into boredom, into melancholy - whence the gloomy faces of so many men of the world, and all those nervous conditions which even lead to suicide. Now, in the carriage which was taking me to M. de Charlus, I was a prey to this second sort of exaltation, very different from that which is given us by a personal impression, such as I had received in other carriages, once at Combray, in Dr Percepied's gig, from which I had seen the spires of Martinville against the setting sun, another day at Balbec, in Mme de Villeparisis's barouche, when I strove to identify the reminiscence that was suggested to me by an avenue of trees. But in this third carriage, what I had before my mind's eye were those conversations that had seemed to me so tedious at Mme de Guermantes's dinner-table, for example Prince Von's stories about the German Emperor, German Botha and the British army. I had just slid them into the internal stereoscope through the lenses of which, as soon as we are no longer ourselves, as soon as, endowed with a worldly spirit, we wish to receive our life only from other people, we give depth and relief to what they had said and done. Like a tipsy man filled with tender feeling for the waiter who has been serving him, I marvelled at my good fortune, a good fortune not recognised by me, it is true, at the actual moment, in having dined with a person who knew Wilhelm II so well and had told stories about him that were - upon my word - extremely witty. And, as I repeated to myself, with the Prince's German accent, the story of General Botha, I laughed out loud, with this laugh, like certain kinds of applause which increase one's inward admiration, were necessary to the magnifying lenses, even those of Mme de Guermantes's pronouncements which had struck me as being stupid (as for example the one about the Hals pictures which one ought to see from the top of a tram-car) took on an extraordinary life and depth. And I must say that, even if this exaltation was quick to subside, it was not altogether unreasonable. Just as there may always come a day when we are glad to know the person whom we despise more than anyone in the world because he happens to be connected with a girl with whom we are in love, to whom he can introduce us, and thus offers us both utility and agreeableness, attributes in which we should have supposed him to be permanently lacking, so there is no conversation, any more than there are personal relations, from which we can be certain that we shall not one day derive some benefit. What Mme de Guermantes had said to me about the pictures which it would be interesting to see, even from a tram-car, was untrue, but it contained a germ of truth which was of value to me later on.
Marcel Proust, The Guermantes Way, pp. 569-570
Truthfully, I initially chose this passage mainly because I was struggling with its meaning, and tagging it and then brooding over it and then commending would, hopefully, give me a chance to sort it out; sort of like when you're in the midst of a fight with your wife and you both agree to revisit the conversation when you've calmed down, but what you're really saying is that you're talk again when you, hopefully, figure out what the hell the other person is saying. In this instance Marcel is leaving the seemingly endless soiree and on the way home in the carriage he reflects, in a classically Proustian way, on the events of the party and in a more general sense on life. Proust writes, "We can as we choose abandon ourselves to one or other of two forces, of which one rises in ourselves, emanates from our deepest impressions, while the other comes to us from without." Not surprisingly, Proust suggests that the former "brings with it naturally a joy, the joy that springs from the life of those who create." Naturally, because it is internal we control it, as Marcus Aurelius reminds us, "Dig within. Within is the wellspring of Good, and it is always ready to bubble up if you just dig." However, Proust also talks about the virtues of the latter, the more external force, which is more dependent upon your perception, and not just your action. One of the things I'm trying to focus in on - as discussed indirectly in the previous post - is living more in the moment, and making a more deliberate effort to connect with those around me. While the internal force is more dependable and more profound, the external force, the external world, provides so much if we'll only open ourselves to it. That said, so much of it is maddening and vacuous (like the idiotic conversations that Marcel had to wade through to find something meaningful) and it takes greater patience and attention and subtlety to separate the wheat from the chaff. Now, do the two forces, the internal and the external, ever merge? I would think yes, by definition. Rumi one time said, "Everyone sees the Unseen in proportion to the clarity of their heart." In this case he was talking about God, but I think it is true in a more general sense to everything around us.
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