Frankenstein

by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

There is something at work in my soul which I do not understand.

I often feared that his sufferings had deprived him of understanding.

How can I see so noble a creature destroyed by misery without feeling the most poignant grief? He is so gentle, yet so wise; his mind is so cultivated, and when he speaks, although his words are culled with the choicest art, yet they flow with rapidity and unparalleled eloquence.

One man's life or death were but a small price to pay for the acquirement of the knowledge which I sought, for the dominion I should acquire and transmit over the elemental foes of our race.

You seek for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been.

It was my temper to avoid a crowd and to attach myself fervently to a few.

The time at length arrives when grief is rather an indulgence than a necessity;

I was required to exchange chimeras of boundless grandeur for realities of little worth.

After days and nights of incredible labour and fatigue, I succeeded in discovering the cause of generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter.

Nothing is more painful to the human mind than, after the feelings have been worked up by a quick succession of events, the dead calmness of inaction and certainty which follows and deprives the soul both of hope and fear.

Have I not suffered enough, that you seek to increase my misery? Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it.

I am malicious because I am miserable. Am I not shunned and hated by all mankind?

You are my creator, but I am your master; obey!"

How mutable are our feelings, and how strange is that clinging love we have of life even in the excess of misery!