“It is beyond my comprehension. Love has entered me like a disease, so stealthily I have not seen its approach nor heard its footsteps. My mind recognises the folly of it and yet I still boil and burn with it, precisely as with a fever.”
Merivel confesses to Pearce the affections that he harbors for Celia which have developed over time although she is unaware of this. Even though Merivel is married to Celia, their union is a pretense in order for the King to hide the fact that she is, in fact, his mistress. The assertion encompasses the meaning of love in that it is not a choice but rather something that creeps up to one without their initial knowledge. He is aware he is not supposed to love Celia and also cannot be with her but still it does not cease his feelings. However, his confession to her would lead to his banishment from the court.
“As a child, she allowed me to ask God to grant me things for which my heart longed.”
Merivel recalls his mother’s devotion towards religion and God through her regular prayers which she encouraged him to participate. Religious conviction is a significant motif in the novel, in that the motives of the characters are mostly driven by the church dogmas. In the statement, the reader understands how his childhood would later dictate his convictions later in life. Akin to how he was taught to seek through the power of belief, Merivel pursues restoration after a series of misfortunes.
“And I was entirely held by my own words, as if my words had become a liquid and I immersed in them, like a drowning man in a rushing river.”
Through the narrative, Merivel is seen as a character who fosters his own problems, in that he is a victim of his own doings. Every misfortune that befalls him is a consequence of his actions or inactions. From hard lack in romantic pursuits to a spiral of subsequent tragedies and poor decisions. Therefore, the assertion comprehends how his own words or doings end up suffocating him thus suffering by his own hands.
