Oh , my dear , I thank you for this year ! It has been your royal gift to me , and I shall be rich and great forever because of it . Nothing can ever take it from me , nothing can mar it . It were well to have lived a lifetime of loneliness for such a boon -- the price would not be too high . I would not give my one perfect summer for a generation of other men 's happiness . There are those in the world who would laugh at me , who would pity me , Una . They would say that the love I have poured out in secret at your feet has been wasted , that I am a poor weak fool to squander all my treasure of affection on a woman who does not care for me and who is as far above me as that great white star that is shining over the sea . Oh , my dear , they do not know , they can not understand . The love I have given you has not left me poorer . It has enriched my life unspeakably ; it has opened my eyes and given me the gift of clear vision for those things that matter ; it has been a lamp held before my stumbling feet whereby I have avoided snares and pitfalls of baser passions and unworthy dreams . For all this I thank you , dear , and for all this surely the utmost that I can give of love and reverence and service is not too much . I could not have helped loving you . But if I could have helped it , knowing with just what measure of pain and joy it would brim my cup , I would have chosen to love you , Una . There are those who strive to forget a hopeless love . To me , the greatest misfortune that life could bring would be that I should forget you . I want to remember you always and love you and long for you . That would be unspeakably better than any happiness that could come to me through forgetting . Dear lady , good night . The sun has set ; there is now but one fiery dimple on the horizon , as if a golden finger had dented it -- now it is gone ; the mists are coming up over the sea . A kiss on each of your white hands , dear .
Tonight I am too humble XXXXX lift my thoughts to your lips .
at before for from in than that through to with