Claude's Confession by Émile Zola

I have reached that plenitude of despair which is almost rest. I cannot suffer additionally; this certainty that nothing can augment my tears is a solace. My being has torn itself to such an extent that it has stopped in pity. To-day, I can only wipe away my tears.

And yet I feel that I have need of Heaven to be cured. I have the brutishness of pain, I have not the tranquil joy of health. If my wounds cannot be enlarged, they cannot remain open, bleeding drop by drop, with inexorable suffering.