“ Love, you see, is a great vanity, which requires the lesser vanities to be in harmony with itself—especially in marriage. ”
Honoré de Balzac, Lost Illusions (1843). copy citation
| Author | Honoré de Balzac |
|---|---|
| Source | Lost Illusions |
| Topic | marriage vanity |
| Date | 1843 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by Ellen Marriage |
| Weblink | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/13159/pg13159.html |
Context
“could you doubt that she would be free sooner or later? And can you suppose that she would like to be Madame Chardon? It was worth while to take some trouble to gain the title of Comtesse de Rubempre. Love, you see, is a great vanity, which requires the lesser vanities to be in harmony with itself—especially in marriage. I might love you to madness—which is to say, sufficiently to marry you—and yet I should find it very unpleasant to be called Madame Chardon. You can see that. And now that you understand the difficulties of Paris life, you will know how many roundabout ways you must take to reach your end;”
source
