"
"NO CORD OR CABLE CAN DRAW
so forcibly or bind so fast," says melancholy Burton, "as love can do
with only a single thread." "Where there exists the most ardent and true
love," says Valerius Maximus, "it is often better to be united in death
than separated in life." "A man of sense may love like a madman," says
Rochefoucauld, "but not like a fool." Says Addison, who was a bachelor,
and knew little about the heart: "Ridicule, perhaps, is a better
expedient against love than sober advice; and I am of the opinion that
Hudibras and Don Quixote may be as effectual to cure the extravagance of
this passion as any one of the old philosophers." "Love lessens woman's
delicacy and increases man's," says Richter. This accords with common
observation. "It makes us proud when our love of a mistress is
returned," says Hazlitt, in a rambling manner; "it ought to make us
prouder still when we can love her for herself alone, without the aid of
any such selfish reflection. This is the religion of love." All such
argument proceeds on the theory that love is a sawing of wood, a digging
of potatoes, or some such "emotion," to be entirely controlled by the
will and regulated by the decencies.
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