TEMPTER. That's well thought out; and, as a view, can be defended. She wanted to make you better than herself, higher and purer, so that she could look up to you! But you can find an equally good explanation for that. A wife's always angry and out of humour with her husband; and the husband's always kind and grateful to his wife. He does all he can to make things easy for her, and she does all she can to torture him.
STRANGER. That's not true. Of course it may sometimes appear to be so. I once had a woman friend who shifted all the defects that she had on to me. For instance, she was very much in love with herself, and therefore called me the most egoistical of men. She drank, and called me a drunkard; she rarely changed her linen and said I was dirty; she was jealous, even of my men friends, and called me Othello. She was masterful and called me Nero. Niggardly and called me Harpagon.
TEMPTER. Why didn't you answer her?
STRANGER. You know why very well! If I'd made clear to her what she really was, I'd have lost her favour that moment—and it was precisely her favour I wanted to keep.
TEMPTER. A tout prix! Yes, that's the source of degradation! You grow accustomed to holding your tongue, and at last find yourself caught in a tissue of falsehoods.
STRANGER. Wait! Don't you agree that married people so mix their personalities that they can no longer distinguish between meum and tuum, no longer remain separate from one another, or cannot tell their own weaknesses from those of the other. My jealous friend, who called me Othello, took me for herself, identified me with herself.
TEMPTER. That sounds conceivable.
STRANGER. You see! You can often explain most if you don't ask who's to blame. For when married people begin to differ, it's like a realm divided against itself, and that's the worst kind of disharmony.
TEMPTER. There are moments when I think a woman cannot love a man.
STRANGER. Perhaps not. To love is an active verb and woman's a passive noun. He loves and she is loved; he asks questions and she merely answers.