Volume 9 / Act 3 — SCENE V
Reading edition
LEONARD (alone).
"I must, I must marry her!" And why must I? She is going to do a crazy thing in order to keep her father from doing one. Where lies the necessity of my doing a still crazier thing in order to ward off hers? I cannot admit the necessity—at least not until I see before me the man who wants to get ahead of me with the most insane act of all! And if he thinks as I do about it there will be no end! That sounds quite sensible, and yet—I must follow her! Here comes somebody! Thank God!—Nothing is more ignominious than to have to be at variance with one's own thoughts! A rebellion in the head, in which one brings forth viper after viper and each one tries to eat the other or bite his tail, is the worst of all!