nils

“As for the memory of Rodolphe, she had thrust it down into the depths of her heart; and there it remained, as solemn and still as a king’s mummy in an underground chamber. From this great embalmed love rose an exhalation that passed through everything, perfuming with tenderness the atmosphere of spotless purity in which she wanted to live. When she knelt at her Gothic prie-dieu, she would address the Lord with the same sweet words she used to murmur to her lover in the ecstatic transports of her adultery. This she did in the hope of making faith come to her; but no divine delectation descended from heaven, and she would get to her feet, her arms and legs tired, with the vague sense that it was all an immense hoax.”
― Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary