The Pursuit of Forbidden Life

Pursuing these reflections, I thought, that if I could bestow animation upon lifeless matter,

I might in process of time (although I now found it impossible) renew life where death had apparently

devoted the body to corruption. These thoughts supported my spirits, while I pursued

my undertaking with unremitting ardour. My cheek had grown pale with study, and my person had

become emaciated with confinement. Sometimes, on the very brink of certainty,

I failed; yet still I clung to the hope which the next day or the next hour might realize.

One secret which I alone possessed was the hope to which I had dedicated myself; and the

moon gazed on my midnight labours, while, with unrelaxed and breathless eagerness,