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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Sarrasine by Honore de Balzac: to describe,--for such phenomena take place in a sphere inaccessible
to human observation,--insisted upon manifesting itself with
deplorable violence. Looking at him, you would have said that he was a
cold, dull man. Renown, science, future, life, prizes, all vanished.
" 'To win her love or die!' Such was the sentence Sarrasine pronounced
upon himself.
"He was so completely intoxicated that he no longer saw theatre,
audience, or actors, no longer heard the music. Nay, more, there was
no space between him and La Zambinella; he possessed her; his eyes,
fixed steadfastly upon her, took possession of her. An almost
diabolical power enabled him to feel the breath of that voice, to
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