The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

“If he be Mr. Hyde,” he had thought, “I shall be Mr. Seek.”

There comes an end to all things;

put your heart in your ears

But his love of me is won­der­ful; I go fur­ther: I, who sicken and freeze at the mere thought of him, when I re­call the ab­jec­tion and pas­sion of this at­tach­ment, and when I know how he fears my power to cut him off by sui­cide, I find it in my heart to pity him.

The hatred of Hyde for Je­kyll was of a dif­fer­ent or­der.

And this again, that that in­sur­gent hor­ror was knit to him closer than a wife, closer than an eye; lay caged in his flesh, where he heard it mut­ter and felt it struggle to be born; and at every hour of weak­ness, and in the con­fid­ence of slum­ber, pre­vailed against him, and de­posed him out of life.

When I would come back from these ex­cur­sions, I was of­ten plunged into a kind of won­der at my vi­cari­ous de­prav­ity. This fa­mil­iar that I called out of my own soul, and sent forth alone to do his good pleas­ure, was a be­ing in­her­ently ma­lign and vil­lain­ous; his every act and thought centered on self; drink­ing pleas­ure with bes­tial avid­ity from any de­gree of tor­ture to an­other; re­lent­less like a man of stone.

It was Hyde, after all, and Hyde alone, that was guilty. Je­kyll was no worse; he woke again to his good qual­it­ies seem­ingly un­im­paired; he would even make haste, where it was pos­sible, to undo the evil done by Hyde. And thus his con­science slumbered

And now,” said he, “to settle what re­mains. Will you be wise? will you be guided? will you suf­fer me to take this glass in my hand and to go forth from your house without fur­ther par­ley? or has the greed of curi­os­ity too much com­mand of you?

Think be­fore you an­swer, for it shall be done as you de­cide. As you de­cide, you shall be left as you were be­fore, and neither richer nor wiser, un­less the sense of ser­vice rendered to a man in mor­tal dis­tress may be coun­ted as a kind of riches of the soul. Or, if you shall so prefer to choose, a new province of know­ledge and new av­en­ues to fame and power shall be laid open to you, here, in this room, upon the in­stant; and your sight shall be blas­ted by a prodigy to stag­ger the un­be­lief of Satan.”