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 OXFORD WORLD’S CLASSICS

T R A C TAT U S LO G I C O - P H I LO S O P H I C U S

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) was born into a wealthy Austrian

family at the centre of Vienna’s cultural life at the end of the
nineteenth century. The youngest of eight children, he was educated
at home until he was 14, and studied mechanical engineering in
Berlin from 1906 to 1908 and then aeronautical engineering in
Manchester from 1908 to 1911. During this time, he became
interested in the foundations of mathematics, inspired by the
writings of Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell. Recommended by
Frege to study with Russell, he enrolled as a research student at
Cambridge in February 1912 and worked with Russell until he went
to Norway in October 1913 to develop his ideas. On the outbreak of
the First World War, he joined the Austro-Hungarian army, fighting
on the Eastern and Italian Fronts. Drawing on remarks made in
notebooks throughout this period, the text of what became the
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus was essentially completed during a
period of leave in 1918. Captured at the end of the war in Italy, he
spent ten months in Italian prisoner-of-war camps before returning
to Vienna in August 1919. Having given away a considerable
inheritance, he trained as a schoolteacher and taught in various
Austrian villages from 1920 to 1926. The Tractatus was published in
German in 1921 and in English in 1922, translated by Frank Ramsey.
Its publication established Wittgenstein’s renown and his influence
as a philosopher grew, particularly amongst members of the Vienna
Circle and in Cambridge. He returned to Cambridge in 1929 to be
awarded a doctorate and a fellowship at Trinity College. In 1939 he
succeeded G. E. Moore as Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge, a
position he held until resigning in 1947. He died of cancer in 1951.
Posthumous publication of Philosophical Investigations (1953), On
Certainty (1969), and a substantial Nachlass contributed to
Wittgenstein’s position as a central figure in the development of the
analytic tradition in philosophy.
Michael Beaney is Professor of History of Analytic Philosophy at the
Humboldt University in Berlin, Regius Chair of Logic at the University
of Aberdeen in Scotland, and Visiting He Lin Chair Professor of
Philosophy at Tsinghua University in Beijing. Educated at Oxford, he
taught at various universities in London and Yorkshire before taking
up his current posts. He is the editor of The Oxford Handbook of the
History of Analytic Philosophy and author of Analytic Philosophy: A
Very Short Introduction. As well as the history of analytic philosophy,
his research interests include Chinese philosophy, creativity,
historiography, and philosophical methodology.
 OXFORD WORLD’S CLASSICS
For over 100 years Oxford World’s Classics have brought
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 OX F O R D W O R L D ’ S C LASS I C S

LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN

Tractatus
Logico-Philosophicus

Translated with an Introduction and Notes by

MICHAEL BEANEY
 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom
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 PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

In my second year as an undergraduate at Oxford, at

an introduction to transcendental meditation, I met
someone who had just moved to Oxford, having
given up his studies in philosophy at Cambridge. He
told me that the only book worth reading was
Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations. I bought
a copy at Blackwells on the way back and began
reading it straightaway. I was gripped, and
Wittgenstein has been with me ever since.
Wittgenstein’s Later Philosophy was one of the
options available as a PPE student, and I took it in
my final year with Peter Hacker, who initiated me into
its mysteries. Peter may well regard some of the
views I now have on Wittgenstein as heretical, but I
am grateful to him for challenging me both then and
in all his subsequent writing to read Wittgenstein
with the utmost scholarly care. Since the opening
sections of Wittgenstein’s Investigations discuss his
earlier ideas, I was inevitably led to the Tractatus
Logico-Philosophicus. That text is notoriously
difficult, but the received view in Oxford at the time
was that it contained a set of assumptions and
claims that Wittgenstein spent the rest of his life
criticizing. Although he had officially rejected
metaphysics in the Tractatus, there were still some
lingering metaphysical assumptions, and these had
to be rooted out as well by a more ‘grammatical’
investigation.
As a postgraduate, I continued to work on
Wittgenstein’s philosophy but now realized the
importance of Russell’s and especially Frege’s work in
understanding what Wittgenstein had been
attempting to achieve in the Tractatus. He both
develops some of their views and offers a powerful
critique of others, and it became clear that there was
more continuity between his early and later
philosophy than many believed. Some of the ideas of
the Tractatus continue to influence philosophers
today, while others are transformed in subtle ways in
his later work, which is only gradually being
appreciated. My doctoral dissertation was on Frege
and Wittgenstein, and I have been teaching and
writing about their thought and the history of
analytic philosophy, more generally, ever since. One
of my favourite subjects at school had been German,
for which I have to thank my teacher Ian Waters,
and I translated some of Frege’s work for the edition
I published in 1997, The Frege Reader. This made
available, in a single volume, a selection of the key
texts that are essential to understanding analytic
philosophy today—and Wittgenstein’s philosophy, in
particular.
In September 2018, Luciana O’Flaherty of OUP
contacted me to ask about publishing the Tractatus
in the World’s Classics series, since it would be out of
copyright in 2022, seventy years after Wittgenstein’s
death, and if so, whether a new translation was
preferable to the original one. I assured her that the
Tractatus should be included in the series, as the
classic of early twentieth-century analytic philosophy,
and that a new translation was essential. Having
translated some of Frege’s writings, I offered to
translate it myself, not least as I used my own
translations of it anyway, or revised those of others,
in my teaching and writing. Luciana welcomed the
offer and we met to discuss the project. I am
grateful to Luciana for all her advice and support in
guiding this project through from beginning to end.
I prepared a first draft of the translation in
teaching a course on the Tractatus at the Humboldt
University in Berlin in Summer Semester 2020. I
circulated a document with three columns—the
original German, my draft translation, and notes on
the translation. The aim of the course was not just to
make sense of the Tractatus but also to appreciate
the issues involved in philosophical translation. The
participants, many of whom were native German
speakers, were encouraged to comment on the
translation, which helped in improving it. I thank the
following for their valuable contributions: Andreas
Berghaus, Sophia Bobic, Simon Brausch, Rebecca
Eilfort, Joao Fidalgo, Milan Hartwig, Solveig Hepp,
Ben Jähnert, Xiaolan Liang, Moritz Markowski, Lea
Mosandl, Ben Rangnick, Tom Raysmith, Josephine
Schulze, Peter Schwarz, Lukas Sonnabend, Martin
Spielhagen, Myriam Stihl, Troy Vine, Arjun Wendrich,
Christoph Werner, Bastian Wessalowski, Tao Xu, and
Jiantao Zhang. The course was one of the most
enjoyable that I have taught (despite having to do so
online during the pandemic) and our discussions
were instructive. The native German speakers often
disagreed about what certain terms meant, which
showed the importance of consulting widely, with the
interpretive issues explained. We also considered
alternative renderings and how they might be back
translated into German, which helped us appreciate
Wittgenstein’s actual formulations. In the end,
though, the translator must rely on their own
interpretation of the text and their native-speaker
knowledge of the language into which they are
translating to find the best rendering. So I take full
responsibility for any errors or infelicities that remain.
That same summer of 2020 I co-organized with
David Stern a two-day online workshop on
translating the Tractatus, supported by a grant from
the British Society for the History of Philosophy, for
which I record our thanks. David had told me at a
conference on Wittgenstein the previous autumn that
he was doing a new translation of the Tractatus for
Cambridge University Press, as part of a project that
involved (re)translation of Wittgenstein’s writings
leading up to the Tractatus. We agreed to
collaborate, not on the translation itself, on which we
had different views (such as on the rendering of
‘Satz’) and different constraints (such as our primary
intended readership), but on thinking about the
principles of translation to be followed. We invited
various Wittgenstein scholars with an interest in
issues of translation and interpretation, with a view
to co-editing a collection of papers on the subject.
The participants in the workshop were Cora
Diamond, Philip Ebert, Juliet Floyd, Jim Klagge,
Michael Kremer, Alfred Nordman, Martin Pilch, Alois
Pichler, Erich Reck, Katia Saporiti, Joachim Schulte,
Hans Sluga, Mark Textor, and two of my PhD
students, Troy Vine and Thomas Raysmith, who
made notes on the meetings. David and I each
circulated in advance a paper formulating our views
on translating the Tractatus, and we received
extremely helpful feedback, for which we are both
very grateful. I am also indebted to David for the
exchanges we have had, and our ongoing
collaboration on the edited collection. I have not yet
seen a draft of his translation, other than of a few
key propositions, but I look forward to that, as a
valuable complement to my own. The more good
translations there are of a text, the more one can
triangulate on its meaning.
Following the workshop I circulated various drafts
of the translation, as I continued to revise it, not just
to the participants in the workshop but to several
others, including Wolfgang Kienzler, Han Linhe, Jiang
Yi, David Hyder, Joshua Eisenthal, and Sophia
Arbeiter. I also gave a talk on translating the
Tractatus at an online conference organized by
Huang Min at Sun Yat-sen University in China in
November 2021. I thank all those who sent me
comments (including those just named), often on
specific terms and passages on which they had
particular views. I did not always follow their advice,
but it helped in coming to what I hope were the right
decisions. I would especially like to thank Wolfgang
Kienzler and Martin Pilch for detailed email exchange
on numerous passages.
Drafts of the editorial material have also been
discussed with various people, including members of
the Research Colloquium that I run at the Humboldt
University in Berlin, students taking my online course
on the Tractatus at Tsinghua University in Beijing,
and some of my colleagues at the University of
Aberdeen. For comments on this, as well as on
specific points of translation, I am grateful to the
following: Roland Bolz, Paul Cultus, Yael Gazit,
Yuchen Guo, Eva Henke, Hang Huang, Jing Huang,
Asher Jiang, Oscar Joffe, Jesper Kallestrup, Louis
Kohlmann, Martha Kunicki, Xiaolan Liang, Matthias
Statzkowski, Ulrich Stegmann, Norman Stockman,
Hamid Taieb, Stephan Torre, and Tue Trinh. Three
others deserve special thanks: Cheryl Misak and
Martin Pilch (again), who helped me with the Note
on the Text, and Erich Reck, who provided detailed
comments on the penultimate draft of the
Introduction. Responsibility for these as well, of
course, remains with me.
As always, I am grateful to my wife Sharon
Macdonald and our children Tara, Thomas, and
Harriet, for many discussions over the years as we
have grappled with the German language in our
different ways, but especially for comments on
specific issues in translating the Tractatus. Sharon
has read and provided invaluable help on all the
editorial material, as well as the translation itself, and
patiently supported me in the periods of obsessive
focus that were required to complete the various
parts.
 Finally, I would like to thank all those at OUP who
have helped prepare this book for production, not
just Luciana O’Flaherty (again) but also (and
especially in this last stage) Henry Clarke, Bharath
Krishnamoorthy, Daniel Gill, and the eagle-eyed
copy-editor Dorothy McCarthy. I write this Preface
almost a century to the day after the publication of
the first English translation of the Tractatus. I hope
that this new translation, and the editorial material
provided, will usher in a new phase in the reception
of this extraordinary work.

Michael Beaney
October 2022
 CONTENTS

Abbreviations
Introduction
Note on the Text
Select Bibliography
A Chronology of Ludwig Wittgenstein

TRACTATUS LOGICO-PHILOSOPHICUS

Appendix: The Tree Structure of the Main

Propositions of the Tractatus
Explanatory Notes
Glossary
 ABBREVIATIONS

The following abbreviations of works by Wittgenstein are used in the

text. Full publication details are given in the Select Bibliography.

BB The Blue and Brown Books

BT The Big Typescript
CV Culture and Value
GT Geheime Tagebücher
LO Letters to C. K. Ogden
LPA Logisch-philosophische Abhandlung
NB Notebooks 1914–1916
OC On Certainty
PG Philosophical Grammar
PI Philosophical Investigations
PR Philosophical Remarks
PT Prototractatus
RFM Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics
RLF ‘Some Remarks on Logical Form’
RPP Remarks on the Philosophy of Psychology
TLP Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
WC Wittgenstein in Cambridge: Letters and Documents
1911–1951
WLL Wittgenstein’s Lectures, Cambridge 1930–1932
WVC Ludwig Wittgenstein and the Vienna Circle
 INTRODUCTION

Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, first

published in German in 1921 and in English
translation in 1922, is one of the most important
philosophical works of the twentieth century and one
of the founding texts of analytic philosophy, which is
now the dominant philosophical tradition in the
world. It offers an impressively integrated account of
the relationship between language, logic, and the
world, rooted in the conception of propositions as
pictures, that has had a powerful influence on
philosophical thinking ever since. Anyone who reads
the text for the first time, with little knowledge of
Wittgenstein’s philosophical background, however,
will struggle to make much sense of the details. It
may strike one as intriguing, exciting, and profound,
but also intimidating and obscure, especially as one
encounters the propositions about logic. There is a
crystalline and aphoristic quality to many of the
propositions, which make them memorable and
quotable, not least the famous last proposition, but
exactly what they mean is far from clear. The
numbering system suggests a sophisticated
organization, yet one struggles to understand how
everything fits together. And most notoriously, by the
time one gets to the end of the book, we find
Wittgenstein telling us that the propositions of the
Tractatus are nonsense, which we have to get over if
we are to see the world correctly. Does he really
mean that all of the propositions are nonsense, and
if some are not, then which ones and how do we
tell? How can we understand nonsensical
propositions at all, and what on earth are we then to
make of the book?
With all the controversy and variety of
interpretations that the book has generated over the
last century, purists may wish to insist that any new
edition of the Tractatus should present the text
exactly as it originally appeared (and ideally, if in
translation, then with the original German on facing
pages) with no scholarly apparatus, to ensure that
editorial bias does not colour the reader’s
understanding. The only exception might be to allow
the original introduction by Bertrand Russell, with
whom Wittgenstein had worked in developing his
earliest ideas. This had been felt necessary to ensure
publication, since, at the time, Wittgenstein (at least
as a philosopher) was almost completely unknown,
while Russell was one of the most famous living
philosophers of all. (See the Note on the Text, which
follows.) Wittgenstein had never been happy with
Russell’s introduction, however, and more than
enough time has elapsed for a new introduction, with
the proper editorial apparatus that we have now
come to expect for fresh editions of classic texts,
especially in this Oxford World’s Classics series.
Although fierce disputes continue within the scholarly
community about the interpretation of the Tractatus,
there is enough consensus about many of the ideas
and themes for an account that reflects this to help a
reader find their way through the text on a first
reading, and the disputes can be presented in such a
way as to enable a reader to make up their own
mind. One aim of this new Introduction is to provide
just such an account, but it will also place the
Tractatus in the wider context of Wittgenstein’s life
and works, the main influences on him, and its place
in the history of philosophy.
Before turning to his life and works, a few words
must first be said about the new translation that has
been done for this edition. (A fuller account is
provided in the Note on the Text.) The original
translation, although appearing under the name of C.
K. Ogden, was in fact mainly done by F. P. Ramsey,
and was published by Routledge and Kegan Paul in
1922. Although Wittgenstein himself advised on the
translation, it shows signs of its age, and is clunky in
many places. A second translation, by D. F. Pears and
B. F. McGuinness, was published in 1961 and revised
in 1974, also published by Routledge and Kegan
Paul. This improves on the earlier translation in
several key respects, but also introduces new
inadequacies and occasionally strays too far from the
original German text in trying to be more fluent
(perhaps a sign of its being done in the heyday of
‘ordinary language philosophy’ in Oxford). A fresh
translation is certainly needed, benefiting from the
extensive debate about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus that
has taken place over the last century, much of which
has also involved discussion about the merits of the
two translations. A glossary and explanatory notes
are also provided, which were not included in either
of the first two translations, to help the
understanding of key terms and passages and to
alert the reader to significant issues of interpretation
that depend on the exact rendering of the German
original.

1. Life and works

Ludwig Wittgenstein was born in Vienna on 26 April
1889, the youngest of eight children, the oldest—
Hermine—being fifteen years older than him. His
father was the industrialist Karl Wittgenstein (1847–
1913), one of the wealthiest men in Austria, and his
mother was Leopoldine (Poldy) Wittgenstein (born
Kalmus, 1850–1926), who was musically gifted and
made music central to the Wittgenstein household.
They were important patrons of the arts in Viennese
society and hosted many concerts in their house.
Music was an important part of Ludwig’s life, and
there are comparisons between written language and
musical notation in the Tractatus. But he wrote little
specifically about music, on the ground that such
things should be allowed to speak for themselves. As
he later put it, ‘Music conveys to us itself !’ (BB, p.
178) This idea that certain things ‘speak for
themselves’ was fundamental to his philosophy
throughout his life.
Ludwig had three sisters and four brothers. The
three oldest brothers all committed suicide: Hans in
1902, Rudolf in 1904, and Kurt in 1918, who shot
himself rather than surrender to the Italians at the
end of the First World War. Paul Wittgenstein became
a well-known pianist, who lost his right arm in the
war but carried on playing with just his left hand.
Ravel later wrote his Concerto for the Left Hand for
him. As well as Hermine, who gradually took over the
role of organizing the family, his sisters were
Margarete (Gretl), who was to marry the wealthy
American Jeremy Stonborough and have her
wedding portrait painted by Klimt, and Helene
(Lenka), who married Max Salzer and whose
daughter Clara married Ludwig’s later close friend
Arvid Sjögren. It was for Margarete that Ludwig was
to design what is now known as the Wittgenstein
house in Vienna in the late 1920s.
Ludwig was educated at home until 1903, when
his father changed his views on how his children
should be taught after the death of Hans (but sadly
too late for Rudolf) and sent Ludwig to a Realschule
(which offered a more practical education than a
Gymnasium) in Linz. (Adolf Hitler, who was just six
days older than Wittgenstein, also attended this
school from 1900 to 1904, but Hitler was a year
behind his year group and Wittgenstein was a year
ahead.) He stayed there until 1906, when he went to
study science and engineering at the technical
university in Berlin, gaining his diploma in May 1908.
From there he moved to Manchester to pursue
research in aeronautical engineering, helping to
design a jet engine. It was here that he read
Bertrand Russell’s Principles of Mathematics (1903)
and Gottlob Frege’s Basic Laws of Arithmetic (1893,
1903) and became interested in the foundations of
mathematics, intrigued by the paradox that Russell
found in Frege’s system (see below). In 1909 he
wrote to Philip Jourdain, a colleague of Russell’s at
Cambridge, offering a solution to the paradox.
Having shown it to Russell, Jourdain wrote back
criticizing the attempted solution, which discouraged
Wittgenstein for a while, but by then the fascination
had taken root and he gradually became more and
more obsessed by philosophical questions.
Having written to Frege in the summer of 1911,
Wittgenstein was invited to visit him in Jena, which
he did a few weeks later. Wittgenstein is reported as
saying: ‘At this first meeting with Frege my own
ideas were so unclear that he was able to wipe the
floor with me.’ Frege nevertheless encouraged him to
come again, and advised him to study with Russell at
Cambridge.1 So it was that Russell got a knock on his
college door on 18 October and the lives of both men
changed dramatically. Wittgenstein attended Russell’s
lectures that term, unofficially, and had discussions
with him. He officially registered as a research
student at Trinity College on 1 February 1912 to work
with Russell, and met him regularly until October
1913, when he went to Norway to work in isolation
on the philosophical problems that occupied him. He
visited Frege twice more, on his way back to Vienna
from Cambridge in December 1912 and again in
December 1913, on his way back from Norway, and
had fruitful discussions with him. In March 1914 G.
E. Moore (1873–1958), then a lecturer at Cambridge,
visited Wittgenstein in Norway and took notes of the
ideas that he had been formulating. These, together
with notes that Wittgenstein had dictated for Russell
before he left for Norway, have survived and shed
important light on the development of his ideas.2
On the outbreak of the First World War
Wittgenstein decided to enlist in the Austrian army
and he served both on the front line, winning awards
for bravery, and in an artillery workshop. Throughout
the war he continued to work out his ideas, writing
remarks in notebooks, several of which also survived
and were published in 1961 as Notebooks 1914–
1916. He had periods of leave in which he selected
some of these remarks and arranged and revised
them into what became the Tractatus, which was
essentially complete before he returned at the end of
September 1918 to the Italian Front, where he was
captured in early November 1918 as the war ended.
He spent the next ten months in Italian prisoner-of-
war camps, but managed to get a corrected copy of
his manuscript sent to Russell. He was finally
released in August 1919, and met with Russell at The
Hague in December 1919 to explain his ideas to him
and enlist his support in getting the Tractatus
published, which eventually appeared in 1921. (For
further details of the composition of the Tractatus
and the difficulties Wittgenstein had in getting it
published, see §4 below and the Note on the Text.)
 Wittgenstein returned to Vienna from the war a
changed man. His father had died in 1913 and he
had received a substantial inheritance. Before the
war he had arranged for some of it to be given to
various writers and artists, among them Rainer Maria
Rilke, Georg Trakl, and Oskar Kokoschka, but in 1919
he formally signed all the rest of it over to his
siblings Hermine, Helene, and Paul (Margarete was
excluded, having married into further wealth). From
that point on he lived frugally, often depending, later,
on friends to look after him. More importantly,
consistent with his claim in the Tractatus that he had
solved all the problems of philosophy, he gave up
philosophy and decided to become a schoolteacher.
Having trained in Vienna, he then taught at various
remote village schools in Lower Austria from 1920 to
1926. Frank Ramsey (1903–30) visited him twice
during this period to discuss the ideas of the
Tractatus with him, and Wittgenstein visited
Manchester and Cambridge in the summer of 1925,
but other than this he had limited philosophical
contact. Having been accused of ill-treating some of
the children in the school in which he was then
teaching (but subsequently cleared) in April 1926,
Wittgenstein resigned and returned to Vienna. From
1926 to 1928 he helped design and supervise the
building of a house for his sister Margarete, a house
influenced by the modernism of Adolf Loos (1870–
1933) and reflecting Wittgenstein’s own personality,
with its austerity, precision, and attention to detail.
It was during this period that he was also
gradually drawn back into philosophy by meetings
with members of the Vienna Circle, a group that had
been formed around Moritz Schlick (1882–1936) to
discuss philosophy, especially philosophy of science
and epistemology. Schlick was Professor of
Naturphilosophie (philosophy of nature) in Vienna,
and the group became known as the logical
positivists (or logical empiricists), famous for their
rejection of metaphysics and for their endorsement
of a ‘scientific’ approach to philosophy. The logical
positivists, who included Rudolf Carnap (1891–1970),
Otto Neurath (1882–1945), and Friedrich Waismann
(1896–1959), were strongly influenced by the
Tractatus, which they had discussed in detail in the
mid-1920s, seeing in Wittgenstein—at least in some
respects—a kindred spirit.3 Another event that played
a role in Wittgenstein’s return to philosophy was a
lecture given by the mathematician L. E. J. Brouwer
(1881–1966) in Vienna in March 1928 on
intuitionism, which inspired Wittgenstein to think
more deeply about logic and mathematics.
In January 1929 Wittgenstein returned to
Cambridge and took up philosophy again, gradually
recognizing the problems in his earlier views and
determined to address them. One of the first results
of this work was ‘Some Remarks on Logical Form’, in
which he tried to resolve one of these problems (see
§6.1 below). This paper was published in the
proceedings of the annual conference of the
Aristotelian Society and Mind Association, held in July
1929, although at the conference itself Wittgenstein
talked about something else instead—generality and
infinity in mathematics (WC, p. 172). The paper
ended up being not only the first thing he published
after the Tractatus but also the last in his lifetime.
Although he remained occupied with philosophical
problems for the rest of his life, continuing his
practice of writing remarks in notebooks and
selecting and revising them into typescripts, he was
never satisfied with what he produced, and nothing
more was published until after his death in 1951.
One such typescript was Philosophical Remarks,
not published until 1975, which he wrote for his
successful application for a five-year research
fellowship at Trinity College, awarded in December
1930. Here he began to criticize some of his earlier
ideas and develop new forms of thinking. This was
carried forward in all his subsequent writings, from
Philosophical Grammar (published in 1974, dating
from 1930–3) and The Blue and Brown Books
(published in 1958, dating from 1933–5) to On
Certainty (published in 1969, dating from the last
years of his life, 1949–51). The most famous of all
his later works is Philosophical Investigations, drafts
of which he had ready to submit at various points in
the 1940s, but which remained unpublished on his
death. It finally appeared, translated by Elizabeth
Anscombe (1919–2001), who had studied with
Wittgenstein, in 1953. This has often been seen as
the mature statement of his so-called ‘later
philosophy’, but few scholars now are happy with this
division of Wittgenstein’s philosophy into ‘early’ and
‘later’. Some have spoken of a ‘middle Wittgenstein’,
between the Tractatus and the Investigations, or of a
‘third Wittgenstein’, reflected in his work after the
Investigations was essentially finished, represented
in On Certainty, among other writings. But the truth
is that Wittgenstein’s ideas evolved continually from
1929, deepening his critique of the Tractatus and
developing a whole range of new ideas, themes,
concerns, and methods, not least in responding to
the views of his contemporaries and earlier thinkers.
During his research fellowship Wittgenstein gave
lectures at Cambridge, on diverse topics from logic
and the foundations of mathematics to aesthetics
and religious belief. Notes were made and have since
been published on many of these lectures, and there
are numerous first-hand reports of his lecturing style.
Norman Malcolm (1911–90), for example, who
attended his lectures in 1939, writes in his Memoir:
His lectures were given without preparation and without notes. He
told me that once he had tried to lecture from notes but was
disgusted with the result; the thoughts that came out were ‘stale’, or,
as he put it to another friend, the words looked like ‘corpses’ when
he began to read them. In the method that he came to use his only
preparation for the lecture, as he told me, was to spend a few
minutes before the class met, recollecting the course that the inquiry
had taken at the previous meetings. At the beginning of the lecture
he would give a brief summary of this and then he would start from
there, trying to advance the investigation with fresh thoughts. He
told me that the only thing that made it possible for him to conduct
his lecture classes in this extemporaneous way was the fact that he
had done and was doing a vast amount of thinking and writing about
all the problems under discussion. This is undoubtedly true;
nevertheless, what occurred in these class meetings was largely new
research.4

In 1936, after his research fellowship had come to

an end, Wittgenstein decided to return to Norway,
and he stayed there from August 1936 to December
1937, with short breaks back in Vienna and
Cambridge. This was when he wrote a draft of the
first 188 sections of the Investigations, and what
became Part I of Remarks on the Foundations of
Mathematics (published in 1967, dating from 1937–
44), which had originally been conceived as
continuing his discussion in the Investigations. He
returned to Vienna afterwards but left before the
annexation (Anschluss) of Austria by Nazi Germany
in March 1938, when he was forced to choose
between applying for German citizenship (as an
Austrian) or British citizenship. German citizenship
was problematic for the Wittgenstein family because
of their Jewish ancestry. While Ludwig’s maternal
grandmother came from an established Austrian
Catholic family, his other grandparents had been
born into Jewish families, although his maternal
grandfather had been brought up as a Catholic and
both of his paternal grandparents had converted to
Protestantism before they married. Ludwig decided
to go back to lecturing at Cambridge and apply for
British citizenship, and in both of these he was
helped by John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946), the
Cambridge economist, who was able to pull the
necessary strings.
In February 1939 Wittgenstein succeeded Moore
as Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge, which
secured his British citizenship, gained in June 1939,
just before the outbreak of the Second World War.
Throughout 1939 he lectured on the foundations of
mathematics, lectures that were attended by Alan
Turing (1912–54), the mathematician and computer
scientist, and he continued to teach until 1941, when
he was allowed to contribute to the war effort,
working, first, as a porter in Guy’s Hospital, London,
and then in a medical research unit investigating
‘wound shock’ in Newcastle upon Tyne. In February
1944 he was called back to Cambridge to work on his
book, but was allowed to do so in Swansea, where
one of his students, Rush Rhees (1905–89), was
teaching. He resumed lecturing in the autumn, this
time on the philosophy of psychology, developing
further his ideas in the Investigations. By the middle
of 1946, he finally finished what came to form Part I
of the Investigations, and wrote the preface. But the
book was still not submitted for publication, as he
continued to develop his ideas, material that became
Remarks on the Philosophy of Psychology (published
in 1980, dating from 1945–8).
In 1947 he resigned from his chair at Cambridge.
He had never been happy as a professional
philosopher, and over the years he had grown
increasingly disillusioned with academic life. He spent
time in Ireland (in Galway and Dublin) and the
United States (staying with Malcolm at Cornell),
before returning to Cambridge where he was
diagnosed with cancer of the prostate in November
1949. He stayed for a while in Oxford with Anscombe
in 1950, but as his health deteriorated, he moved
back to Cambridge to be looked after in the house of
his doctor, Edward Bevan. In his last letter to
Malcolm, dated 16 April 1951, he wrote:
An extraordinary thing has happened to me. About a month ago I
suddenly found myself in the right frame of mind for doing
philosophy. I had been absolutely certain that I’d never again be
able to do it. It’s the first time after more than 2 years that the
curtain in my brain has gone up.—Of course, so far I’ve only worked
for about 5 weeks and it may be all over by tomorrow; but it bucks
me up a lot now. (WC, p. 479)

He died a fortnight later, on 29 April 1951. The last

entry in his notebook, in which he reflects on
whether one can claim to be dreaming while drugged
(OC, §676), was dated 27 April 1951.

2. Influences on Wittgenstein
In 1931 Wittgenstein wrote in his notebook of the
influences upon him:
I think there is some truth in my idea that I am really only
reproductive in my thinking. I think I have never invented a line of
thinking but that it was always provided for me by someone else & I
have done no more than passionately taken it up for my work of
clarification. That is how Boltzmann, Hertz, Schopenhauer, Frege,
Russell, Kraus, Loos, Weininger, Spengler, Sraffa have influenced
me. (CV, p. 16)

Wittgenstein does not do justice here to his own

creativity but the list of influences is revealing. He
had originally just written ‘Frege, Russell, Spengler,
Sraffa’, but then added the other names above the
line. Oswald Spengler (1880–1936), through his main
work, The Decline of the West, published in two
volumes in 1918 and 1922, only influenced him after
the Tractatus was finished, and Piero Sraffa (1898–
1983) only influenced him on his return to
Cambridge in 1929. As far as the Tractatus is
concerned, Wittgenstein’s greatest debt is
undoubtedly to Gottlob Frege (1848–1925) and
Bertrand Russell (1882–1970), both of whom he
singles out in his preface to the Tractatus. Here he
did indeed passionately take up their lines of thinking
in his work of clarification. We will consider the
influence of Frege and Russell in turn,5 before
looking, much more briefly, at the influence of
Heinrich Hertz (1857–94), Ludwig Boltzmann (1844–
1906), and Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860).

2.1. FREGE’S INFLUENCE

Frege is one of the main founders of modern logic—

of what is now known as predicate or quantificational
logic, a form of logic (understood here as logical
theory) that quickly proved to be far more powerful
than traditional logic, which had combined
(Aristotelian) syllogistic theory and (Stoic)
propositional logic. Propositional logic, which is now
seen as more basic, and on which Frege also built,
concerns the logical relations between propositions,
represented as ‘p’, ‘q’, ‘r’, etc., and their logical
compounds, propositions combined by means of one
or more logical connectives, such as ‘not’, ‘and’, ‘or’,
‘if … then …’, yielding ‘not p’, ‘p and q’, ‘p or q’, ‘if p,
then q’, and so on. Here is just a sample of the
logical relations that obtain between such
propositions and their compounds. The conjunctive
proposition ‘p and q’, for example, implies the
disjunctive proposition ‘p or q’ (though not vice
versa), which we can represent as the conditional
proposition ‘If p and q, then p or q’. ‘If p, then q’ is
equivalent to ‘if not q, then not p’ (its contrapositive),
and ‘p and q’ is equivalent to ‘not (not p or not q)’,
showing the interdefinability of the logical
connectives. The various relations can be formulated
as logical laws. For example, ‘not (p and not p)’ is
the law (or principle) of non-contradiction: a
proposition and its negation cannot both be true. ‘p
or not p’ is the law of excluded middle: of any
proposition, either it or its negation is true. It is
natural to think that logical laws tell us something,
but one of Wittgenstein’s most important claims in
the Tractatus is that logical propositions (logical laws
and all that follows from them) are senseless, a claim
that was seen as clarifying their status (see below).
 Syllogistic theory is concerned with the logical
relations between four specific kinds of proposition,
‘All As are Bs’, ‘No As are Bs’, ‘Some As are Bs’, and
‘Some As are not Bs’, where ‘A’ and ‘B’ represent the
relevant predicate (what is being attributed to
something), and ‘all’, no’, and ‘some’ are quantifier
terms, stating how much of something is under
consideration. Here again there are logical relations
to make explicit: ‘All As are Bs’ implies ‘Some As are
Bs’, for example, while contradicting ‘Some As are
not Bs’ (as Aristotle construed these). While
traditional logic gave a coherent account of these
kinds of proposition, however, it had difficulty
handling propositions with more than one quantifier,
such as ‘All philosophers respect some logician’.
Frege’s achievement was to invent a notation for
quantification that enabled him to formalize
propositions involving multiple quantification.
Frege’s key move lay in extending function–
argument analysis from mathematics to logic. In
analytic geometry, in representing a line as y = ax +
b, we exhibit y as a function of x, where x represents
the argument of the function and a and b are
constants, a being the gradient of the line and b the
point where the line cuts the y-axis on a graph. If a
= 2 and b = 3, for example, then we have the
function y = 2x + 3: for argument x = 1, the value of
the function is 5; for x = 2, y = 7, and so on. Frege
generalized the idea: not just mathematical
equations but all propositions can be analysed in
function–argument terms. Take the simplest kind of
proposition, ascribing a predicate to a subject, such
as ‘Gottlob is human’. Traditional logic had analysed
this as having the form ‘S is P’, with ‘S’ representing
the subject (‘Gottlob’) and ‘P’ the predicate
(‘human’), connected by the copula (‘is’). Frege,
however, analysed it as having the form ‘Fa’, with ‘a’
representing the argument (‘Gottlob’) and ‘Fx’ the
function (‘x is human’), the variable x indicating
where the argument term goes to complete the
proposition. ‘Gottlob is human’ is thus taken to be
the value of the functional expression ‘x is human’
for the argument term ‘Gottlob’.
Relational propositions are analysed similarly, in
this case as functions of two or more arguments. In
analysing ‘Gottlob is shorter than Bertrand’, for
example, ‘Gottlob’ and ‘Bertrand’ are taken as the
argument terms and ‘x is shorter than y’ as the
relational expression, symbolized as ‘Rxy’ or ‘xRy’.
The power of function–argument analysis, however,
only fully comes out in analysing propositions
involving quantifiers. Take the proposition ‘All
logicians are human’. In traditional logic this was
seen as having the same form as ‘Gottlob is human’,
the subject being ‘all logicians’ rather than ‘Gottlob’,
and the copula plural (‘are’) rather than singular
(‘is’). But on Frege’s analysis, it has a very different
form, symbolized in modern notation as ‘(∀x) (Lx ⊃
Hx)’, read as ‘For all x, if x is a logician, then x is
human’. Here what we have are two functional
expressions, ‘x is a logician’ and ‘x is human’, joined
by the logical connective ‘if … then …’ (symbolized by
‘⊃’) and bound by the universal quantifier (‘for all x’,
represented using an inverted ‘A’). (In the notation
that Wittgenstein takes over from Russell, the
universal quantifier is symbolized simply by ‘(x)’
rather than ‘(∀x)’.6)
‘Some logicians are human’ is also analysed as
having a more complex quantificational form,
symbolized in modern notation as ‘(∃x) (Lx & Hx)’,
read as ‘There is some x such that x is a logician and
x is human’. Again what we have here are two
functional expressions joined by a logical connective,
in this case ‘and’ (symbolized by ‘&’) and bound by
the existential quantifier (‘there is some x’,
represented using a backwards ‘E’). (In the notation
that Wittgenstein takes over from Russell, ‘and’ is
symbolized by the full stop ‘.’ rather than ‘&’. ‘(∃x)’ is
used for the existential quantifier.) With such
notation, propositions involving multiple
quantification can be formalized. ‘All philosophers
respect some logician’, for example, turns out to be
ambiguous, depending on whether we are claiming
that there is some (at least one) logician whom every
philosopher respects or merely that, for any
philosopher, there is some logician whom they
respect (not necessarily the same one).
Quantificational logic provides a neat way of
clarifying this ambiguity:

(1) (∃y) (Ly & (∀x) (Px ⊃ Rxy)).

(2) (∀x) (Px ⊃ (∃y) (Ly & Rxy)).

The first can be read as ‘There is some y such that y

is a logician and for all x, if x is a philosopher, then x
respects y’, and the second as ‘For all x, if x is a
philosopher, then there is some y such that y is a
logician and x respects y’. The difference in meaning
is reflected in the order of the quantifiers—either ∃∀
or ∀∃. Furthermore, their logical relations are
different, reflected in their asymmetry: while the
second can be inferred from the first, the first cannot
be inferred from the second (mistakenly thinking that
it can is known as the quantifier shift fallacy).
We see here an excellent example of the power of
Frege’s logic. The use of quantificational notation
clarifies the relevant logical relations and facilitates
the drawing and testing of inferences. Frege called
the logical notation he created ‘Begriffsschrift’
(literally, ‘concept-script’), a term that Wittgenstein
takes over in the Tractatus, though he criticizes the
precise form that Frege’s (and Russell’s) notation
took (see e.g. 3.325, 5.533). On Wittgenstein’s view,
it is only once ‘everything is in order in our sign-
language’ that we attain a correct logical conception
(4.1213). So here, too, one can see him as taking up
in his work of clarification the line of thinking that
Frege invented.
In doing so, Wittgenstein also endorsed function–
argument analysis: ‘I construe a proposition—like
Frege and Russell—as a function of the expressions
contained in it’ (3.318). But once again, his own
account of this was rather different from theirs. For
Frege, the most fundamental logical relation was the
relation of an object’s falling under a concept,
expressed in the most basic kind of thought we can
have, such as in thinking that Gottlob is human:
applying the concept human, understood as a
function (‘x is human’), to the particular object
named Gottlob (the name filling the argument-place
in the functional expression). Wittgenstein left it
open what the basic kinds of thoughts were,
however: this would be revealed by logical analysis.
They might be relational propositions of the form
‘Rxy’ or ‘Rxyz’ instead. But he assumed that there
was an ultimate level to be reached, comprising what
he called ‘elementary propositions’ (4.21), each
understood as a function of names (4.24). In
elaborating on this, he drew on one of the central
ideas of the Tractatus, that a proposition should be
seen as a picture of a state of affairs (2.11 ff.). We
will return to this in the next section.
As to the relationship between elementary
propositions and other, more complex propositions,
here, too, he saw a functional relationship: ‘A
proposition is a truth-function of elementary
propositions’ (5). He elaborates this conception in the
rest of the 5s (the remarks that comment on 5), and
we will return to this in §4. Once again, then, we can
see Wittgenstein as ‘clarifying’ the line of thinking
opened up by the possibility of function–argument
analysis. At the root of this, for Frege, was the
fundamental logical relation of an object’s falling
under a concept, but we can see Wittgenstein as
taking the more general idea of a functional relation
itself as the most fundamental.
Wittgenstein’s account of all this, as elaborated in
the Tractatus, was intended to overcome the various
problems that he saw in Frege’s logic and philosophy
—and, as we will shortly see, also in Russell’s logic
and philosophy. Two of the key problems concern
Frege’s distinction between object and concept and
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calla... por de pronto. Y tal sucedió con la de Rocaverde. Entretuvo
agradablemente y con inusitada frecuencia en sus salones á la
gente del buen tono, y ya cesó ésta de ocuparse en averiguar de
dónde salían aquellas misas, dado que la sacristía la había dejado á
secas el difunto.
¡Y qué período aquél de fiestas, á las que concurría todo lo más
selecto y granado de la aristocracia, de la banca, de la prensa y de
las artes!
Allí se hacía música; allí se declamaba, poniéndose en escena á
veces, en un teatrito al caso, por las jóvenes más pudorosas y los
hombres más formales, lo más aplaudido del repertorio
contemporáneo... francés, por supuesto; y allí, finalmente, se
celebraban esos bailes pintorescos que tanto dieron que hacer á los
sastres, á las modistas y al sentido común, en la confección de
trajes alegóricos: trajes de crepúsculo, trajes de tempestad, trajes de
luna, trajes de ira, trajes de compasión... trajes de todo lo
imaginable, pues la gracia estaba en representar una estación del
año, ó una hora del día, ó una efeméride, ó una pasión, ó una virtud,
ó una enfermedad, ó el Mississipi, ó el cable submarino, de cuatro
tijeretadas sobre algunas varas de tul ó de satén, entretenimiento
que tomaban y suelen tomar por lo serio nuestros hombres de
Estado y nuestra prensa grave.
Pasaron así algunos años, al cabo de los cuales se fué observando
que el tiempo hacía los mismos estragos en la cara de la condesa
que en sus salones; es decir, que éstos dejaban de revestirse con el
lujo y la frecuencia de costumbre, á medida que aquélla se
marchitaba.
Poco á poco fueron disminuyendo en número las fiestas, y llegó un
día en que dejaron éstas de ser periódicas, y se convirtieron en
extraordinarias, en casos raros.
En este período fué cuando la de Rocaverde, como si quisiera
reconcentrar las débiles fuerzas de sus recursos agonizantes, según
la fama, para consagrarlas á un solo objeto de más fácil logro, se
dedicó, con la saña propia de una beldad en ruinas, á quemar fuera
de su casa los últimos fuegos de su esplendor. Por eso la hemos
visto, según Isabel y la marquesa, luchando con la elegancia de la
primera, y conquistando el supuesto amante de la segunda; brillo y
adoraciones que el tiempo la iba negando.
Á esta misma época pertenece la reunión á que vamos á asistir
como espectadores el lector y yo; fiesta trabajosa, como preparada
con las rebañaduras de la antigua abundancia, y decidida entre
angustias de bolsillo y exigencias de acreedor.
No por eso ofrecía su casa aquella noche triste aspecto: había
rodado por ella demasiado la abundancia, para que no quedara en
días de apuro algo con que cubrir las apariencias.
En cuanto á la concurrencia, se componía, como siempre, de lo
mejor de la «buena sociedad» madrileña.
Allí estaba la encanijada solterona aristocrática, verdadera gaviota
imponderable, envuelta en muelle plumaje de céfiros y encajes; la
robusta matrona de plateados rizos y sonora voz, égida, guía y
maestra de su pimpollo, aspirante á cortesana, fresca y delicada
criatura que, viendo del revés sus conveniencias, buscaba aquel
agosto sofocante para desarrollar sus abriles risueños; las del
jubilado funcionario X***, de quienes se contaba que, puestas por su
padre en la alternativa de comer patatas y vestir con lujo, ó comer
de firme y vestir indiana, optaron sin vacilar por lo primero; la rolliza
codiciada heredera de un banquero de nota, buscando con ojos de
diamantes una ejecutoria de primera clase para ennoblecer las
peluconas de su padre; la sublime viuda, de rostro dolorido, que
entretenía allí sus penas mientras labraba en un claustro retirada
celda para enterrarse en vida; la dama esplendorosa y rozagante
que movía un huracán con sus vestidos y muchas tempestades con
sus coqueterías; la inofensiva esclava del buen tono, que se exhibía
así por cumplir un deber de su «posición»; la pudorosa beldad que
recitaba arias de Norma y cantaba monólogos de Racine...
Pululando, culebreando, plegándose como mimbres ó irguiéndose
como alcornoques (no siempre han de ser palmeras los términos de
comparación), veíase al «distinguido» pollo, osado, enjuto y con el
emblema de su linaje hasta en los faldones de la camisa; al joven
sentimental que cantaba de tenor, y aguardando á que se lo
suplicasen, lanzaba miradas de agonía á las mujeres sensibles; al
«hombre de mundo» que cifra sus glorias en herborizar en la mies
del vecino mientras abandona la propia á la rapacidad de otros
botánicos; al ferviente demócrata, cuya sátira implacable era en
cafés y en periódicos el azote de las clases de levita; pero que solía
reconciliarse algunas veces con el frac y los guantes blancos,
cuando le invitaban á codearse con la aristocracia, y, sobre todo, á
cenar con ella; y por último, cruzando los salones, ó retorciéndose el
mostacho enfrente de cada espejo, ó adoptando posturas
académicas en cada esquina, al hombre parco en saludar, de ancho
tórax y pescuezo corto, de buenas carnes y soberbia estampa, que
no hablaba á nadie, pero que parecía decir á todo el mundo:
«caballeros, esto es lo que se llama un buen mozo»; hombres
felices si los hay, que al volver á casa esperan siempre oir llamar á
su puerta al discreto lacayo que les trae perfumado billete en que la
marquesa, su señora, les pide una cita y su amor.
Al paño, es decir, medio oculto entre los de una portière, el literato
viejo, aplaudido autor dramático que buscaba en aquel cuadro
modelos para sus caracteres, ó que gustaba de que creyesen los
demás que eso es lo que hacía; el anciano papá que devoraba un
bostezo, mientras sus hijas devoraban más afuera con los ojos otros
tantos acomodos de ventaja; el recién presentado, joven de pocas
malicias y menos resolución, que ardía en deseos de lanzarse á
aquel mundo en que recreaba su vista, y no se atrevía, porque no
conocía á nadie ni confiaba gran cosa en su travesura.
Más atrás, el hombre de Estado departiendo sobre la última sesión
de Cortes ó preparando una combinación ministerial; el flamante
gobernador de provincia, que le escuchaba á respetuosa distancia
porque le debía el destino... y quizás el frac novísimo que vestía, y
que concurría allí, según él, para dar un adiós al mundo de los
placeres; según otros, á tomar aires de importancia y un poco de
escuela que implantar en los salones del alcázar de su ínsula.
Hojeando los álbumes en los gabinetes, ó chupando los puros de la
casa en las salas de fumar, el hombre de negocios, el rico banquero,
el general encanecido en cien pronunciamientos, digo batallas, el
periodista de nota, etc., etc., etc.
Y sobre todos estos grupos, por encima de tanto personaje,
dominándolo todo, el tipo por excelencia, el hombre indispensable,
la verdadera necesidad del presente siglo en las altas regiones de la
moda: Lucas Gómez. Por eso su entrada en el salón era una
entrada triunfal; y aunque indigesto de faz y mal cortado de talle,
saludábanle las viejas, sonreíanle las mamás, mirábanle tiernas las
solteronas y buscaban con ansia sus lisonjas las beldades más
altivas.
Lucas Gómez era el cronista, el trompetero de aquellas fiestas; el
mejor y más digno cultivador de esa literatura de patchoulí que ha
fijado la reputación de ciertas publicaciones serias entre la gente
«de importancia». De él eran, y nadie se las disputaba, ciertas
frases felices de «buen tono»; de él eran los chocolates
bullangueros, los tés bailantes, los colores fanés, los abriles de tul,
las pasiones de popelina, y tantísimos otros neologismos con que se
enriqueció la literatura elegante, que devoraban y devoran con
especial deleite los nobles herederos de las glorias de aquellos
grandes hombres cuyos hechos asombraban al mundo. Él, erudito
de guardarropía, con una paciencia admirable hacía la historia y
describía los mil detalles de cuanto llevaba sobre su persona cada
mujer; él restauraba á las feas llamándolas simpáticas; él sahumaba
á las hermosas comparándolas con el arrebol de la aurora ó con un
bouquet de violetas, lirios y rosas de Alejandría; él adulaba á la
obesa mamá llamándola gentil matrona, y mal había de andar el
asunto para que la enjuta y acartonada solterona de ojos de
basilisco y hocico de merluza, no alcanzara en sus crónicas, cuando
menos, la cualidad de espiritual; hacía á todos los hombres de
negocios, opulentos; á todos los militares, bizarros; á todos los
periodistas, eminentes; á todos los títulos de Castilla, preclaros
varones; á todos los artistas, inspirados, y á todos los gacetilleros,
populares literatos.
Para aquel hombre todo se subordinaba á las leyes del buen tono:
hasta la muerte; pues al gemir sobre la fresca tumba de una dama
noble, no recordaba sus virtudes, ni las fingía siquiera, sino que
inventariaba sus roperos, sus joyas, sus carruajes, sus admiradores
y sus talentos para brillar en aquel mundo que perdía en ella el
mejor de sus atractivos, el más esplendente de sus astros.
Tal era Lucas Gómez, el mimado y lisonjero cronista de las fiestas
del gran mundo cuyos buffets le engordaban.
Pues bien: hallándose reunidos todos los enumerados y otros
muchos elementos por el estilo; estando, como si dijéramos, en
pleno la reunión, fué cuando aparecieron en ella nuestros
conocidos: radiante de satisfacción y de hermosura Isabel,
descompuesta y febril la marquesa, en babia su marido, y hecho un
mártir Ramón en su postizo traje de etiqueta.
Tres embestidas había dado aquella mañana la de Rocaverde al
aderezo consabido, y ya se disponía el joyero á enviársele, de
acuerdo con el encargo que, después de la segunda, le había hecho
el vizconde, cuando se presentó éste otra vez en la tienda con la
contraorden que sabemos.
Cómo se pondría la vanidosa señora al entender que no solamente
no existía ya la alhaja en venta, sino que la había adquirido Isabel, y
por mediación del vizconde, adivínelo el lector. Todos sus talentos
de mujer de mundo, todo su don de gentes, toda su experiencia en
el trato de ellas, fueron necesarios para que no cometiera aquella
noche cien inconveniencias al «hacer los honores» de su casa. Iba y
venía sin tregua ni sosiego, aunque risueña y cortesana siempre,
sus ojos lanzaban fuego y su lengua era un cuchillo. Observándola
bien, había en ella, como diría un imitador ramplón de las
extravagancias de Víctor Hugo, algo del viento que zumba, algo de
la pólvora que se inflama, algo del perro que muerde... sobre todo
cuando recibió á Isabel y la vió engalanada con el fatal adorno.
Centellearon sus ojos, y al estrecharla las manos con exagerada
pasión, cualquiera diría que pulverizaba entre sus dientes las duras
piedras del aderezo.
Isabel, que se gozaba en aquel martirio, hízole la presentación de su
cuñado; recibióle ella con la burla más fina y más punzante que
pudo proporcionarla su deseo de vengarse de algún modo de la
hermosa dama; y tomando de la mano al impávido lugareño, llevóle
de persona en persona á todas las de la reunión, presentándole
como «un hermano político de Isabel, que acababa de llegar de su
pueblo».
Importábanle muy poco á Ramón aquellas exhibiciones ridículas,
puesto que las aprovechaba para recorrer mejor todos los rincones
de la casa en busca del objeto que á ella le había conducido: el
vizconde. Le había visto una sola vez, pero estaba seguro de que le
conocería donde quiera que le hallara. Así es que cuando la
condesa, acabada la burlesca revista, le soltó de su mano, Ramón,
convencido de que el vizconde no se hallaba aún en la casa, sólo se
cuidó de elegir en ella un punto desde el cual pudiera observar la
llegada de aquél.
Y llegó, en efecto, á las altas horas, seguido de una pequeña corte
de admiradores, invadiendo el salón principal como terreno
conquistado.
Conocióle en el acto Ramón, y disimulando cuanto pudo sus
intenciones, púsose sobre sus huellas y procuró no perderle de vista
un solo momento.
Nada de particular observó en mucho tiempo, sino algún que otro
rumor al pasar, referente á cierto chasco dado á la condesa, y
alguna que otra mirada al adorno de Isabel; rumores y miradas que
convertía al punto en substancia la aprensiva obcecación del
sencillo aldeano. Su cuñada, entre tanto, aunque objeto, como
siempre, de las atenciones de todos, no fijaba su conversación con
nadie, y el vizconde mismo no había hecho más que saludarla,
como á otras muchas personas.
Continuó la reunión con sus peripecias de carácter; y al llegar el
cansancio y el hastío, que son dos de ellas, fuéronse replegando á
las orillas muchos tertulianos que antes parecían no caber en el
salón entero ni tener, en todas las de la noche, horas suficientes
para gastar los bríos que llevaban.
De estos retirados eran el vizconde y sus amigos, que se habían
colocado á la embocadura de un gabinete. Ramón se instaló en el
gabinete mismo, ocultándole los pliegues de la cortina á las miradas
del primero, y no tardó en advertir que los calaveras, vamos á decir,
colmaban de felicitaciones y plácemes á su jefe, que éste recibía
con afectada solemnidad, como un héroe las coronas. Llamábanle
«Cid de los salones», «Sansón de toda esquivez», «rey de la reina»
y otras cosas semejantes; respondía á todas el laureado, que
«había cumplido su palabra»; que «las montañas más altas tienen,
tanteadas de cerca, algún sendero por el cual son accesibles», y así
por el estilo.
Hasta allí, el diálogo, aunque muy malicioso é intencionado, era
soportable para el que le escuchaba afanoso detrás de la cortina;
pero bien pronto salió á relucir el nombre de Isabel con todas sus
letras, y entonces sintió Ramón una cosa dentro de sí con la cual no
contaba. Zumbáronle los oídos, y una nube sangrienta le obscureció
los ojos. Había ido á aquella casa con el único objeto de observar, y
veía venir sobre su temperamento impresionable algo que iba á
poder más que su resignación.
Tras el nombre de Isabel vinieron al diálogo las alusiones tan claras
como injuriosas, y, por último, se evocó, por el mismo vizconde, con
burla sangrienta, el de Carlos, «pacientísimo marido y predestinado
borrego».
Al oir esto, Ramón no pudo sufrir más: ciego de ira, aunque
conservando todavía una sombra de respeto al sitio en que se
hallaba, cogió al vizconde, que hablaba desde el salón, por los
faldones del frac; le metió de un tirón en el gabinete, y cuando allí le
tuvo, le sacudió las dos bofetadas más sonoras que ha oído el
presente siglo.
Terciaron los circunstantes, sujetaron al agresor, y empezaron en las
inmediaciones los comentarios de costumbre: atribuyóse el lance
por unos á alguna burla hecha por el vizconde al desentonado
personaje; por otros á una disputa sobre política... por todos á todo
menos á la verdad.
Entre tanto salió Ramón á la sala, no antes que la noticia del lance;
buscó á Isabel, y al hallarla la soltó al oído un «vámonos de aquí»
tan acentuado, tan entero, tan exigente, que no la permitió ni el
tiempo necesario para avisar á la marquesa, que estaba lejos de
ella.
Ya en el coche los dos, Isabel, que conocía algunos pormenores del
suceso, atribuido por el rumor á una broma de mal género que se
había querido dar á su cuñado, se atrevió á preguntarle:
—¿Y qué es lo que te ha ocurrido?
—Nada que pueda interesarte... por ahora,—respondió secamente
Ramón.
No volvieron á hablar una palabra más en el trayecto que recorrieron
juntos.
Al llegar á casa, preguntó Ramón por Carlos, y supo que estaba
recogido ya. Dió las buenas noches á Isabel, y se encerró en su
cuarto.
Arrojó lejos de sí el vestido opresor de etiqueta, sustituyéndole con
el suyo cómodo y holgado; comenzó á pasearse como una fiera en
su jaula, y de este modo pasó más de dos horas. Al cabo de ellas,
rendido por su propia agitación más que por el sueño, tendióse
vestido sobre la cama, y así dejó correr la noche.
¡Jamás le pareció otra más larga ni más penosa! Todo su afán era
que viniera el día para hablar con Carlos.

VIII
Tan pronto como vió penetrar un rayo de luz por las vidrieras, saltó
de la cama, dejó su habitación, se fué derecho á la de su hermano,
en la cual entró sin anunciarse de modo alguno, y no se sorprendió
poco cuando halló á Carlos paseándose y con señales de haber
dormido tanto como él.
Al verle así, no tuvo valor para decirle de pronto toda la verdad. Sin
embargo, juzgó preciso decírsela de alguna manera.
Carlos, por su parte, no pudo disimular el dolor que le causó la tan
temprana visita de su hermano, cuyo aspecto sombrío no revelaba
ninguna noticia tranquilizadora.
—Vengo—dijo Ramón por todo prefacio,—á que echemos un
párrafo, y te ruego que te sientes.
Carlos se dejó caer como una máquina en un sillón, mientras su
hermano se sentaba en otro á su lado.
El infeliz abogado se hallaba en la situación moral del reo á quien
van á leer la sentencia que puede llevarle al patíbulo. El único resto
de fuerza que le quedaba le empleó en sonreirse por todo disimulo.
Después exclamó en son de broma:
—Bien está lo del párrafo; la hora es lo que me choca un poco.
—Pues no debe chocarte—repuso Ramón.—He dormido mal,
porque no estoy acostumbrado á fiestas como la de anoche; y, por
otra parte, ayer me autorizaste implícitamente, puesto que
madrugas tanto como yo, á que entrara en tu aposento si me
encontraba aburrido y solo en el mío.
—Corriente. ¿Y qué quieres decirme?
—Quiero... insistir en mis trece: en que eres poco venturoso.
—¡Otra vez!
—Otra vez y ciento.
—Pues yo insisto en que te equivocas... y te suplico que no
volvamos á hablar del asunto. Soy rico, tengo algún nombre, Isabel
es bella... en una palabra, tengo hasta el derecho de que se me crea
feliz.
—Todo lo tienes, en efecto, menos una mujer que lea en tu corazón
y se amolde á tus hábitos.
—Ya te he dicho que Isabel...
—Isabel no te comprende, ó, por mejor decir, no se toma la molestia
de estudiarte. Tú te desvelas, tú consumes la vida miserablemente
por ella; y ella, entre tanto, triunfa y despilfarra, y jamás tiene en sus
labios una palabra de cariño en pago de tu abnegación.
—Pero Isabel es muy honrada...
—Y por ventura, ¿te atreverás á asegurarlo? ¡Harto hará si lo
parece!
—¡Ramón!...
—No te amontones, y escúchame: tu mujer vive en una atmósfera
en que la vanidad, la lisonja, las rivalidades del lujo y la coquetería
entran por mucho, si no por todo; tu mujer es libre en esa atmósfera,
como el pájaro en la suya; en esa atmósfera vive perpetuamente la
seducción, y tu mujer es muy hermosa. ¿Tendría nada de extraño
que, mientras tú duermes descuidado en la soledad de tu casa,
tendieran en la del vecino redes á tu honra? ¿Y sería tu honra la
primera que ha sido presa en esas redes?
—¡Por caridad, no me atormentes más!
—¿Luego lo crees posible?
—Sí—exclamó Carlos con voz terrible y con los puños crispados,
dejando ya todo disimulo;—hay momentos en que hasta eso creo,
y... ¡sábelo de una vez! padezco horriblemente. Mi dignidad, mi
carácter, la gratitud que debo á su padre, el amor que he llegado á
sentir por ella, su desvío aparente ó cierto hacia mí, su sistema de
vida, el mundo, mi conciencia, mis deberes... todo esto junto, en
revuelta y agitada lucha, es un puñal que tengo clavado en el
corazón, y me va matando poco á poco.
—¡Desdichado! ¿Y por qué no le arrancaste?
—Porque no pude... ni puedo.
—Eres un niño débil, Carlos, y esa debilidad no te la perdonará
Dios, ni el mundo tampoco.
—Y ¿qué he de hacer?
—¿Qué? Tener carácter. Tenle una vez, si aún es tiempo, ó te
pierdes.
—¡Ay, Ramón!—exclamó Carlos con amargura:—eso mismo me lo
digo yo cien veces al día; pero al llegar el momento decisivo; al
recurrir á mi carácter; al imponerme con mi autoridad y mis
derechos, me faltan las fuerzas, y, te lo confieso, hasta llego á creer
que soy yo el reprensible, porque no me ajusto á sus costumbres.
—Pero ven acá, alma de Dios—dijo Ramón, ensañado contra
aquella inaudita manera de discurrir.—¿No has pensado nunca en
que lo que es hoy en Isabel un descuido, hijo de la agitación en que
la trae el mundo, podrá trocarse mañana en indiferencia, y otro día
en olvido, y después en desprecio... y, por último, en una afrenta
para ti, porque ya no será el recuerdo de sus deberes ni el de tu
honra valladar suficiente de su virtud, si hay quien sepa asediarla?
—Pero ¿por qué insistes tú con tan horrible tenacidad en ese tema,
pregunto yo á mi vez?—repuso Carlos con mal reprimida
desesperación.
—Porque me enciende la sangre el ver cómo te desvives por
contemplar á tu mujer, y cómo haces traición á tu carácter y á tu
talento para disculparla, cuando yo tengo pruebas de que Isabel...
no lo merece.
Al oir esto Carlos, pensó ver abierto á sus pies el abismo de todos
los dolores y de todas las afrentas. Faltáronle las fuerzas y el valor
para preguntar cuanto le ocurría en su natural deseo de descubrir la
amarga y temida realidad, y sólo pudo decir con voz ahogada, y
mirando á su hermano con expresión de anhelo, de angustia, de
horror y de esperanza, todo junto:
—¡Pruebas!... ¿De qué?
Ramón se disponía á responder algo que fuera la verdad, sin lo
cruel de la verdad misma, cuando apareció un criado anunciando la
llegada de dos personas que deseaban hablarle con urgencia, y no
pudo menos de bendecir en sus adentros aquella casualidad que
alejaba un poco más el momento de dar á Carlos el golpe fatal.
Carlos, por el contrario, la maldecía, porque á la altura á que habían
llegado las explicaciones, no podía permanecer más tiempo sin
conocer la verdad. Entre tanto, uno y otro extrañaban aquella visita,
supuesto que Ramón, fuera de su familia, no conocía á nadie en
Madrid.
De pronto asaltó á éste el recuerdo del lance de la noche anterior, y
antes que Carlos pudiera adquirir la menor sospecha, se levantó
rápido y se hizo conducir por el criado á la presencia de los dos
visitantes.

IX
—¿Es reservado lo que ustedes tienen que decirme, caballeros?—
les preguntó sin más saludos.
—Cabalmente,—le contestaron.
—Entonces, pasemos á mi cuarto.
Y en él los introdujo, cerrando después cuidadosamente la puerta.
Carlos, mientras esto sucedía, estaba en ascuas. En ciertas
situaciones de la vida, todos los ruidos, todos los movimientos,
todos los colores, todo lo imaginable responde á un mismo objeto: al
objeto de la preocupación que nos domina. Aquellos dos personajes
preguntando por su hermano, á quien nadie conocía en Madrid; su
ida «al mundo», su inesperada é intempestiva visita á su cuarto, la
interrumpida conversación, todo esto era muy grave y todo le
parecía íntimamente ligado con la tempestad que destrozaba su
alma desde la noche anterior, y más especialmente desde las
últimas palabras que le había dirigido su hermano. Ciego y
desatentado salió tras él, vióle encerrarse en su cuarto con los dos
recién llegados, á quienes tampoco conoció, y pareciéronle siglos
los minutos que duró la secreta entrevista.
Veamos lo que pasó en ella.
Tan pronto como se sentaron los tres, dijo Ramón:
—Sírvanse ustedes manifestarme cuál es el objeto de su venida,
pues yo no tengo el gusto de conocerlos.
Los desconocidos eran personas de gran pelaje: mucho gabán,
mucha patilla, mucho guante, mucho olor á pomada y afeites, y,
sobre todo, mucha afectada lobreguez de fisonomía.
Uno de ellos respondió á Ramón después de carraspear:
—Usted, caballero, no habrá olvidado el lance de anoche.
—¡Ni mucho menos!—exclamó ingenuamente Ramón.—Pero juraría
que no les había visto á ustedes ni á cien leguas de él.
—Es lo mismo para el caso—dijo el otro en tono muy lúgubre.—
Nosotros no venimos aquí por nuestra propia cuenta, sino por la del
señor vizconde del Cierzo.
—¿Y qué se le ocurre tan temprano á ese señor?
—Lo que es natural que se le ocurra después del suceso de anoche.
—Pero como lo más natural en ese caso sería un dentista, y yo no
lo soy...
—Nos permitirá usted que le advirtamos—dijo el hasta entonces
silencioso embajador,—que hay ocasiones en que ciertas bromas no
están justificadas.
—Respondo sencillamente á la observación que me ha hecho este
otro caballero—replicó Ramón;—y como hasta ahora nada me han
dicho ustedes que exija mayor solemnidad, no veo por qué ha de
tomarse á broma mi respuesta.
—Pues bien—dijo el señalado por Ramón,—para abreviar y para
entendernos de una vez: venimos de parte del señor vizconde del
Cierzo á pedir á usted una satisfacción.
—¡Satisfacción á mí!—exclamó Ramón haciéndose cruces.—¿Por
qué y para qué?
—Por lo ocurrido anoche, y para vindicar sin honor nuestro
representado.
—¿Les ha dicho á ustedes ese señor por qué le abofeteé yo?
—Lo sabemos perfectamente.
—¿Y aún se atreve á pedirme satisfacciones?
—Es natural.
—¡Natural! ¿Por qué ley? ¿Con qué criterio?
—Por la ley que rige en toda sociedad decente, y con el criterio de
todo el que se tenga por caballero.
—Pase la decencia de esa sociedad, siquiera porque estuve yo en
ella; en cuanto á que el vizconde sea un caballero, lo niego
rotundamente.
—Señor mío—exclamó el más soplado de los dos representantes,—
hemos venido aquí á pedir á usted cuenta de un agravio hecho
públicamente á un caballero, y no es esa respuesta la que á usted le
cumple dar.
—Efectivamente; pero la doy porque la que procede no puedo
dársela más que al interesado, que se ha guardado muy bien de
ponerse á mis alcances.
—Es decir, que rehusa usted...
—¡Pues no he de rehusar?
—En ese caso, nombre usted otras dos personas que se entiendan
con nosotros.
—¿Para qué?
—Para arreglar los términos en que usted y el señor vizconde...
—¿De cuándo acá necesito yo procuradores para esas cosas?
—Desde que no están autorizados los duelos sin ese requisito.
—¡Acabaran ustedes con mil demonios!... ¡Conque se trata de un
duelo?
—Como usted se resiste á dar una satisfacción cumplida...
—Vamos, es ésa la costumbre... Y no extrañen ustedes ésta mi
ignorancia, porque allá, en mi pueblo, no se gastan tantas
ceremonias para romperse el bautismo dos personas que desean
hacerlo.
—Ya lo suponíamos. De manera que, ahora que está usted al
corriente de todo, no se resistirá á nombrar esas dos personas...
—Respecto á eso, señores míos, lo mismo que antes.
—¿Es decir, que tampoco quiere usted batirse?—dijo el emisario de
más aire matón, mirando al desafiado con un poquillo de
menosprecio.
—En manera alguna,—insistió Ramón muy templado.
—Me parecía á mí—objetó con desdeñoso gesto,—que cuando se
abofeteaba á un hombre en público, habría valor suficiente en el
agresor para responder más tarde con las armas en la mano.
—Poco á poco, señor mío—saltó Ramón muy amoscado.—Tengo
mi opinión formada sobre eso que se llama entre ustedes lances de
honor, opinión que no juzgo necesario exponer ahora; mas esto á un
lado, y aún considerada la cuestión con el criterio de ustedes, creo
que el único hombre que no tiene derecho para acudir á ese terreno
es aquél á quien, como al vizconde, abofetea otro por haberle
infamado cobardemente, y por lástima no le mata.
—¡Rancias ideas!...—exclamaron riendo ambos padrinos.
—Y ¿á quién hace usted creer—añadió uno de ellos,—que rehusa
un lance por eso y no por otra cosa peor?
—¿Y á mí qué me importa que se crea ó que se deje de creer?—
contestó Ramón con la mayor naturalidad.—Lo que puedo asegurar
á ustedes es que á media vara de mis barbas no se reirá nadie de
mí sin que le meta yo las suyas hacia adentro... Y esto les baste á
ustedes.
—Ya se ve, cada uno tiene de su propia honra la idea que mejor le
parece, por más que...
—¿Por más que, qué?—preguntó Ramón muy en seco.
—Por más que á la sociedad no le parezca tan bien.
—En pocas palabras, caballeros, y por si á ustedes les va pasando
por la cabeza que puede ser miedo lo que me hace hablar así. Que
tengo el corazón en su lugar, lo he visto ante cien peligros algo más
graves que el que ofrece el cañón de una pistola de desafío, que
acierta una vez por cada ciento que dispara; y en cuanto á lo
demás... sin jactancia, no sería para mí, ni siquiera empresa difícil,
echar á cada uno de ustedes por el balcón, ó á los dos juntos si me
pusieran en ese caso.
—¡Caballero!—exclamaron los dos embajadores poniéndose muy
foscos y de pie.
—Aseguro á ustedes—se apresuró á decir Ramón con la mayor
ingenuidad,—que no he dicho eso en son de amenaza, ni mucho
menos, sino para indicarles de algún modo que no es miedo ni
debilidad lo que me domina... y para que les vaya sirviendo de
gobierno.
—Pues bien—observó uno de los padrinos más dulcificado en tono
y en gesto,—quiere decir, que usted ni da satisfacciones ni acepta
un lance.
—Cabales.
—De manera que implícitamente autoriza usted á nuestro
representado para que, donde quiera que le encuentre, pueda
declararlo así...
—Su representado de ustedes—dijo Ramón ya muy cargado,—
puede hacer eso y cuanto guste, porque corre de mi cuenta
arrancarle á bofetadas los dientes que le dejaron en la boca las dos
de anoche, donde le encuentre, con eso... y sin eso.
Miráronse los padrinos y no con gesto de burla; fingieron lamentarse
del mal éxito de su cometido, porque conocían el carácter del señor
vizconde y temían las consecuencias, y salieron haciendo
reverencias á Ramón, que los condujo á un medio trote hasta la
escalera, por temor de que oliera algo Carlos, que andaba rondando
por las inmediaciones.

X
Reunidos otra vez los dos hermanos, enardecido más y más Ramón
con la escena en que acababa de figurar, é inquieto como nunca
Carlos con lo que aquél le había dicho al separarse de él, se hacía
indispensable para ambos una explicación terminante de todo lo
ocurrido. Bajo tal supuesto, Carlos dijo á su hermano, despojándose
ya de todo miramiento:
—Ramón, no puedo dudar de lo entrañable del cariño que me
tienes. Pues bien: ese cariño y el interés que, como nacido de él,
debe inspirarte mi felicidad, te ponen en el caso de decirme, sin
duelo ni consideración, cuanto pasa. Si lo que pasa es grave, para
poder obrar yo en consecuencia; si son aprensiones mías, para mi
tranquilidad... ¡Todo menos esta situación de horribles temores!
¿Qué significa esa visita; qué las últimas palabras que me dijiste al ir
á recibirla; qué tu ida inesperada á la sociedad... qué, en fin, tantos
otros sucesos raros que estoy observando desde ayer?
—Nada... y mucho—respondió Ramón, que siempre temía herir
demasiado directamente el corazón de su hermano.—Nada, si aún
es tiempo de atajar el mal en su progreso; mucho, si lo que he visto
no son amagos, sino la enfermedad misma.
—Pero ¿qué has visto?—preguntó Carlos con ansiedad.—¿No
reparas que en la situación en que se encuentra mi espíritu, más
daño que la realidad misma me hacen los miramientos con que me
la ocultas?
—¡Tienes razón, voto al demonio!—dijo Ramón conmovido.—¿Á
qué tantos rodeos ni preparativos cuando el enfermo puede morirse
entre tanto? Escucha. Las dos personas que acaban de estar
conmigo, venían á pedirme una satisfacción en nombre del vizconde
del Cierzo; esa satisfacción me la pedía el vizconde porque anoche
le di dos bofetadas en casa de la condesa de Rocablanca, ó negra,
ó verde, ó como se llame; le pegué las dos bofetadas allí, porque le
oí jactarse de merecer de Isabel más atenciones de las que á tu
honra convienen; se jactaba de ello, porque Isabel lucía unos
diamantes que le había regalado él aquel día; y, por último, fui yo á
la reunión aquélla, porque, después de sorprender por la mañana el
regalo en tu propia casa, vi por la noche que Isabel le llevaba á la
fiesta, lo cual era señal de que le aceptaba de buen grado, y quise
ver en qué términos daba tu mujer á ese hombre las gracias que,
por lo visto, le había prometido. Ésta es la historia compendiada de
los sucesos. He aquí ahora la prueba del más grave.
Y esto dicho, Ramón, sacándole del bolsillo, puso en las manos
trémulas de Carlos el billete que había encontrado en el estuche del
aderezo.
Á medida que el primero iba acercándose al fin de su relato, se
producía una notable transformación en el ánimo de Carlos.
Lo que aterraba á éste, antes de conocer aquellos datos, era la
posibilidad de que le exhibieran una prueba de que Isabel no era ya
dueña del corazón que jamás creyó él poseer por entero. En tal
caso, el mal no tenía ya remedio. Isabel era mujer al cabo, y podía
tener ésa y aun otras debilidades análogas. Pero lo que le decía
Ramón era de un género incompatible con ella, y demasiado, por
tanto, para tomado al pie de la letra. Isabel podría llegar á faltar á
sus deberes, pero no de aquel modo; podría conquistar su virtud un
hombre, pero no un hombre como el vizconde; podría vencérsela
con una pasión, pero jamás con una dádiva, como á una esquiva
niñera; podría, en fin, por una aberración de su talento y de su
carácter, llegar á dejarse dominar por un acto semejante, y aun á
recibir una expresión material de su cariño; pero hacer ostentación
de ella á la faz del mundo, á la de su propio marido, jamás. Isabel
podría serlo todo, menos vulgar y necia.
Arguyéndose así Carlos á medida que Ramón le hablaba, cuando
tomó en sus manos el papel mencionado, asombróse el último al
observar que no le producía el efecto que él temía. Carlos no estaba
tranquilo, ni mucho menos; mas para el hombre que había llegado
en sus recelos al punto á que él había llegado, la historia hecha por
Ramón y el contenido ambiguo del billete eran, ya que no un
consuelo, cuando menos una tregua en su posible desventura.
Así, pues, leído el papel con gran presencia de ánimo, dijo á
Ramón:
—En todo esto hay un crimen indudablemente; una verdadera
infamia, que no quedará impune; pero esta infamia no es, ni ser
podía, de Isabel.
—¿De quién es entonces?—preguntó Ramón admirado.
—Del que firma este billete,—respondió Carlos estrujándole en su
mano.
—Y ¿qué más da para ti?
—¡Mucho, Ramón! Pude haber perdido á Isabel á más de la honra;
y hasta aquí no veo más que una apariencia de ello, tal vez
preparada por ese miserable. Tremendo será esto para mí, pues
rastros dejan tales apariencias que no se borran jamás; pero, al
cabo, no es el peor de los dos males que me amenazaban.
—Pero ¿en qué puedes tú fundarte para aceptar esa idea?
—En tu propio relato, en este papel, en el carácter de tu cuñada... y
en otras mil razones que tú no puedes alcanzar, porque no conoces
como yo el mundo ni el corazón humano.
—¿Y en esa confianza vas á dormirte otra vez?
—¡Oh, eso no!—dijo fieramente Carlos, que ya se había puesto de
pie.—Colocado para mis propósitos en la peor de las hipótesis, voy
á proceder en todo, y sin pérdida de un solo instante, con la energía
que tienes derecho á exigir de mí. ¡Yo te juro que no he de dar al
mundo el triste espectáculo de un marido resignado!
Y esto dicho, y dejando á Ramón en su cuarto, se dirigió al de
Isabel.

XI
Habíase ésta levantado rato hacía, porque su sueño de aquella
noche no había sido tan tranquilo como los de costumbre, merced al
recuerdo del lance de su cuñado; recuerdo á que, en la soledad de
sus meditaciones, daba mil formas y colores diferentes, aunque, en
honor de la verdad, le examinó por todas partes menos por donde
debía, lo cual prueba la gran tranquilidad de su conciencia en ese
particular, y hasta qué punto se embotan los espíritus más sutiles
cuando sólo se alimenta la cabeza de pueriles vanidades.
Grande fué su sorpresa cuando vió entrar á Carlos, cuyo semblante
disimulaba mal el estado de su alma.
—Isabel—la dijo, sentándose á su lado,—seguramente que no
podrás tacharme, en buena justicia, ni de hombre egoísta ni de
marido intolerante.
La sorpresa de Isabel rayó en asombro al oirle hablar así.
—Y ¿por qué me dices eso?—le preguntó.
—Porque no me califiques de importuno ni de ligero por lo que
pienso decirte; porque entiendas que estás en este momento en el
caso de hablarme con la lealtad que tengo derecho á esperar de tu
carácter y de las consideraciones que te he guardado siempre.
—Por favor, Carlos—dijo Isabel angustiada:—si quieres que
responda á tus propósitos, dime claro cuáles son éstos, y no me
atormentes más con ese lenguaje tan extraño en ti.
—Voy á hacerlo. Respetos á la memoria, para mí siempre sagrada,
de tu padre, y á tus propios merecimientos, me impidieron, desde
que soy tu marido, decirte lo que, pesándome demasiado sobre el
corazón, ha venido haciendo de mi vida un martirio insoportable.
—¡Carlos!
—Sí, Isabel: un martirio horrible, un calvario angustioso.
—Pero ¿por qué?
—Por no atreverme á decirte: «El género de vida que traes, el
elemento en que vives, lejos de mí, lejos de toda verdad, es la
senda que conduce más fácilmente al olvido de todos tus deberes».
—Pero ¿me hablas de veras, Carlos?
—Con el corazón en los labios, Isabel; y déjame continuar. No me
atrevía á decirte: «La mujer que lo consagra todo á los triunfos