Letters of a Javanese princess/Chapter 24
XXIV[1]
WE will not, we cannot believe that our lives will be only commonplace and monotonous like the lives of thousands of others before us, and as wall be those of thousands of those who come after us! and yet any other destiny seems so improbable. Only once the fulfilment of our nearest and dearest wishes seemed near; now it is unattainably far away.
There are hours when the tortured human heart, torn with doubt, cries, "My God, what is my duty?" Seeing two duties which directly oppose and antagonize one another. Yet how can two things that are diametrically opposed be called by the same name?
"Stay," says a voice behind me, "surrender your own wishes and longings to the will of him who is dear to you, and to whom you are dear; the struggle has been good, for it has served to strengthen and ennoble your own spirit. Stay!" And then again, I hear another voice ever loud and clear, which says: "Go, work for the realization of your ideals; work for the future; work for the good of thousands who are bent beneath the yoke of unjust laws, who have a false conception of good and evil. Go suffer and fight. Your work will be for all time!" Which is the higher duty, the first or the last?
There are not many people in the world, never mind how closely they may be bound together by ties of blood, who love and understand one another as do my Father and I. There is much resemblance in our characters. We sympathize in everything with each other; there is only one point where we differ. Oh, why that one, why? Is it true, what is told us, that in the whole of wide, wide nature no two things are absolutely alike?
Father has borne so patiently with all my caprices; I have never heard a harsh or bitter word from his lips. He is always loving, always gentle. Through everything I feel his great love. Some time ago when I pressed him for a decision, he looked at me so sorrowfully, it was as if his sad eyes asked, "Are you in such haste to leave me, child?"
I turned away my head; I did not wish to see the dear true eyes; I wanted to be strong and not weak.
My heart almost broke once, when, as we two stood opposed to each other, father clasped me in his arms, and in a voice trembling with emotion said, "Must it be so, child? Is there no other way? Must it be?" And we stayed there, heart pressed to heart, looking into each other's eyes.
That was a heavy time, as heavy as a time can well be on this earth. It was shortly before Father's illness. Later, when father was recovering, Mother said to me, "Ah, child, give in to him."
"I cannot," I answered in a choking voice.
Since then Mother has never spoken about it to me. But when Father gives his consent, she will not withhold hers. She is all love and tenderness towards us, but that only makes the struggle the harder.
Pain nothing but pain, is all that we have brought to those true loving hearts.
- ↑ To Mevrouw Abendanon.