" Oft his jealousy "shapes faults that
are not" and he taints his heart and brain with needless doubt. "Ten
thousand fears invented wild, ten thousand frantic views of horrid
rivals, hanging on the charms for which he melts in fondness, eat him
up." Such passion inflames love but corrodes the soul. In perfect
love, as I said at the beginning of this chapter, jealousy is
potential only, not actual.
IV. COYNESS
When a man is in love he wears his heart on his sleeve and feels eager
to have the beloved see how passionately it throbs for her. When a
girl is in love she tries to conceal her heart in the innermost
recesses of her bosom, lest the lover discover her feelings
prematurely. In other words, coyness is a trait of feminine love--the
only ingredient of that passion which is not, to some extent, common
to both sexes. "The cruel nymph well knows to feign, ... coy looks and
cold disdain," sang Gay; and "what value were there in the love of the
maiden, were it yielded without coy delay?" asks Scott.
'Tis ours to be forward and pushing;
'Tis yours to affect a disdain,
Lady Montagu makes a man say, and Richard Savage sings:
You love; yet from your lover's wish retire;
Doubt, yet discern; deny, and yet desire.
Such, Polly, are your sex--part truth, part fiction,
Some thought, much whim, and all a contradiction.
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