The first symptom of a profound passion is an all-absorbing self-abnegation. The fondest dream of a heart really touched, is to make for the loved one the most extraordinary and difficult sacrifice.
How hard it is to subdue the temper, or to change one's nature! yet from the moment a man loves he is metamorphosed. If a miser, to please he will become a spendthrift, and he who feared a shadow, learns to despise death. The corrupt Don Juan emulates the virtuous Grandison, and, earnest in his efforts, he believes himself to be really reformed, converted, purified regenerated.
This happy transformation will last through the hopeful period. But as soon as the remodelled pretender shall have a presentiment that his metamorphosis is unprofitable; as soon as the implacable voice of discouragement shall have pronounced those two magic words, by which flights are stayed, thoughts paralyzed, and hopeful hearts deadened, "Never! Impossible!" the probation is over and the candidate returns to the old idols of graceless, dissolute nature.
The miser is shocked as he reckons the glittering gold he has wasted. The quondam hero thinks with alarm of his borrowed valor, and turns pale at the sight of his scars.
The roué, to conceal the chagrin of discomfiture, laughs at the promises of a virtuous love, calls himself a gay deceiver, great monster, and is once more self-complacent.
Freed from restraint, their ruling passions rush to the surface, as when the floodgates are opened the fierce torrent sweeps over the field.
These hypocrites will feel for their beloved vices, lost and found again, the thirst, the yearning we feel for happiness long denied us. And they will return to their old habit, with a voracious eagerness, as the convalescent turns to food, the traveller to the spring, the exile to his native land, the prisoner to freedom.
Then will reckless despair develop their genuine natures; then, and then only, can you judge them.
Ah! I breathe freely now that I have explained my feelings What do you think of my views on this profound subject—discouragement in love?
I am confident that this test must sometimes meet with the most favorable results. I believe, for example, that with Roger it will be eminently successful, for his own character is a thousand times more attractive than the one he has assumed to attract me. He would please me better if he were less fascinating—his only fault, if it be a fault, is his lack of seriousness.