“ Only a woman can know what it is to lose a love which sprang from the heart and was genuine throughout, a passion which was not ephemeral, and satisfied at once the spirit and the flesh. ”
Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides (1841). copy citation
| Author | Honoré de Balzac |
|---|---|
| Source | Letters of Two Brides |
| Topic | passion love |
| Date | 1841 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by R. S. Scott |
| Weblink | http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1941/1941-h/1941-h.htm |
Context
“I exclaimed one morning, as my sister-in-law flung herself on my neck. "You have some nobility that we lack."
Ah! Renee, if I still live, it is doubtless because Heaven tempers the sense of affliction to the strength of those who have to bear it. Only a woman can know what it is to lose a love which sprang from the heart and was genuine throughout, a passion which was not ephemeral, and satisfied at once the spirit and the flesh. How rare it is to find a man so gifted that to worship him brings no sense of degradation! If such supreme fortune befall us once, we cannot hope for it a second time. Men of true greatness, whose strength and worth are veiled by poetic grace, and who charm by some high spiritual power, men made to be adored, beware of love!”
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