Furthermore, nothing wearies gallant-love like passion-love from the other side.
Often a clever man, paying court to a woman, just sets her thinking of love in a sentimental frame of mind. She receives this clever man kindly for giving her this pleasure—he conceives hopes.
But one fine day that woman meets the man, who makes her feel what the other has described.
I do not know what are the effects of a man's jealousy on the heart of the woman he loves. Displayed by an admirer who wearies her, jealousy must inspire a supreme disgust, and it may even turn to hatred, if the man he is jealous of is nicer than the jealous one; for we want jealousy, said Madame de Coulanges, only from those of whom we could be jealous.
If the jealous one is liked, but has no real claims, his jealousy may offend that feminine pride so hard to keep in humour or even to recognise. Jealousy may please women of pride, as a new way of showing them their power.
Jealousy can please as a new way of giving proof of love. It can also offend the modesty of a woman who is over-refined.
It can please as a sign of the lover's hot blood—ferrum est quod amant. But note that it is hot blood they love, and not courage à la Turenne, which is quite compatible with a cold heart.
One of the consequences of crystallisation is that a woman can never say "yes" to the lover, to whom she has been unfaithful, if she ever means to make anything of him.
Such is the pleasure of continuing to enjoy the perfect image we have formed of the object of our attachment, that until that fatal "yes"—
L'on va chercher bien loin, plutot que de mourir,
Quelque prétexte ami pour vivre et pour souffrir.