"The dog it was that died"

Late last night, I finished reading "The Painted Veil" by W. Somerset Maugham.
The novel was filled with so many beautiful statements that I would love to quote, however I will only focus on one quote from the book.
I can't put my finger on what caught my heart when I read this particular line, but I imagine, it evoked many thoughts of which I would like to share.
Just before I carry on, I would like to point out that you need not have read the novel in order to understand this blog, so do not panic!
Just to give you the general idea of the plot; the novel focuses on a married couple, Walter and Kitty, who move to Hong Kong due to the nature of Walter's work as a bacteriologist. Kitty has never loved Walter, but she was desperate to get married before her sister. so she accepted his proposal, being well aware that he bored her and that she did not find him attractive in the slightest. Walter loved Kitty though, so much so that he turned a blind eye to the fact that she didn't love him and he was content with being able to love her.
Everything changes when Walter discovers that Kitty has been having an affair and he exacts a very weird revenge.
In order to spite Kitty, Walter has her move with him to an area 600 miles away from Hong Kong, an area suffering from a terrible cholera outbreak.

During their stay in Mei-Tan-Fu, Kitty discovers just how worthless her life used to be, and how shallow she once was. Kitty also begins to understand love and gains an insight into just how deeply she would have hurt Walter due to her infidelity.
Kitty is aware that the initial reason for Walter insisting that she follow him to such a dangerous area, is because he hoped she might die from cholera, however over time it is clear that he no longer wishes her any harm, but greatly despises himself for loving someone whom he very well knew-could never love him.

Walter dies from cholera, but with his last breath, he utters a quote to Kitty as she begs him to forgive her.
Walter says "The dog it was that died." Just as the character Kitty was confused by this statement, so was I. I thought to myself, what a cryptic way to say goodbye?!
Kitty later asks another character known as Waddington, the meaning of Walter's final words, and she is told that it is the final line from Goldsmith's Elegy.
Kitty's curiosity of Walter's final words seemed to end at that point, but mine didn't.
I wanted to understand what Walter was trying to communicate in his final moment, so I decided to look up Oliver Goldsmith's "Elegy on the death of a mad dog."

Good people all, of every sort,
Give ear unto my song;
And if you find it wondrous short,
It cannot hold you long.

In Islington there was a man,
Of whom the world might say
That still a godly race he ran,
Whene'er he went to pray.

A kind and gentle heart he had,
To comfort friends and foes;
The naked every day he clad,
When he put on his clothes.

And in that town a dog was found,
As many dogs there be,
Both mongrel, puppy, whelp and hound,
And curs of low degree.

This dog and man at first were friends;
But when a pique began,
The dog, to gain some private ends,
Went mad and bit the man.

Around from all the neighbouring streets
The wondering neighbours ran,
And swore the dog had lost his wits,
To bite so good a man.

The wound it seemed both sore and sad
To every Christian eye;
And while they swore the dog was mad,
They swore the man would die.

But soon a wonder came to light,
That showed the rogues they lied:
The man recovered of the bite,
The dog it was that died.
-- Oliver Goldsmith

Upon reading this poem, my heart broke many times for Walter, yet, I understood the significance of the last line also being his last line in the novel.
An outsider would have been unaware of the way in which Kitty had hurt Walter, because the knowledge of the betrayal had been kept between themselves and the man with whom she had been unfaithful.
People may have thought her a good wife for following Walter to such a dangerous region, yet they knew not of the underlying reason as to why she had gone.
Walter saw Kitty as the good man in the poem and himself as the mad dog, and just as we know nothing of the reason the good man and the mad dog fall out, outsiders would have known nothing of Walter's reasons for insisting that Kitty follow him to Mei-Tan-Fu.
There was a certainty in Kitty's view that she would surely die from being amidst the cholera epidemic, but lo and behold, it was the "mad dog" Walter who died instead.

I didn't intend to write a literature essay, I just wanted to give sufficient insight into my reasoning for making the next statement:
In all things, no matter how difficult, learn to forgive. Not for the sake of the wrongdoer, but for your own sake.I say this because just like Kitty, I don't believe that Walter died from cholera, I believe that he died of a broken heart and the soul devouring hatred he bore for himself for having loved and received no love in return.
I always remember the "Lord's prayer" in which one asks God to "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us."
If you don't believe in a God, that's fine. You don't need to forgive others in the hopes that God may forgive you for your own sin, but just forgive anyway in order that you might have a lighter heart.
I know forgiving someone who has hurt you greatly is a hard task, but one must remember that to not forgive is to enslave yourself to a negative emotion. In order to be free, you would need to release yourself from the shackles of your negative emotions.

I haven't forgiven a few people for the major wrongs they've done me, however, after reading W.somerset Maugham's wonderfully written book and also Oliver Goldsmith's thought inspiring poem- I have decided that I don't want to be the mad dog. I want to be free and I want the same for anybody reading this.

Lets all agree to forgive, we don't have to find the wrongdoer in order to tell them because they may not care for our forgiveness or even consider that they have done anything wrong. We just need to say it in our hearts and let go of it all.

I hope somehow that this touches somebody somewhere in the world.

x-Cocoa-x