Innuendo

“ Nay, I felt the 'clear keen joyance' of the lark that loves, but 'ne'er knew love's sad satiety.' Hitherto, the pleasure that women had given me had always jarred upon my nerves. It was, in fact, 'a thing wherein we feel there is a hidden want.' Lust was now the overflowing of the heart and of the mind—the pleasurable harmony of all the senses. ”

“ So he shed copious tears and repeated the following verses:
The lover is drunken with love of his fair; In longing and heat he redoubles fore’er.
Love-maddened, confounded, distracted, perplexed, No dwelling is pleasant to him and no fare.
For how, to a lover cut off from his love, Can life be delightsome? ’Twere strange an it were.
I melt with the fire of my passion for her And the tears down my cheek roll and never forbear. ”

“ No lover, longing for his loves, complaineth of desire, But with a doubled stress of woe my heart is overborne.
Of passion I complain to one who hath no ruth on me. How soul and body by desire are, one from other, torn!”
Then her eyes brimmed over with tears, and she wrote these verses also:
“Love-longing, the day of our parting, my body with mourning smote, And severance from my eyelids hath made sleep far remote. ”

“ And with the vehemence of other days, as if they were still among the orange-trees of the old Blue House, the deputy gave way to his eight years of longing.
He told her of the image he nourished in his sadness. Love! The Love that passes but once in a lifetime, crowned with flowers, and followed by a retinue of kisses and laughter. And whosoever follows him in obedience, finds happiness at the end of the joyous pathway; but whosoever, through pride or selfishness, lags by the wayside, comes to lament his folly and to expiate his cowardice in an everlasting life of tedium and sorrow! ”

“ And knowing that every chance of this earth is against his wearing as his bride this sweetheart he has won, Guy’s face is drawn and contorted with the agony of a parting that is to him like death. Sadness is catching as well as love, and the girl gets to sighing and sobbing under his farewells that are so solemn—though she can’t guess why. ”

“ Suppose, now, the husband died (and I regret that I can not regard this contingency with disgust) and there were at least a sporting chance of my stepping into his shoes—oh! of course not at once, but later—later—why, then I could face permanent loyalty and temporary asceticism with a light heart.... But to go through the world refusing all sweets because my favorite sweet has been appropriated, surely that were foolish.
"Again, am I in love with her? Can one fall in love so suddenly, outside the realm of fiction? ”

“ They confuse that rude instinct which is jealousy, physical and base, with the higher and more ardent love—the virile affirmation of possession with the fresher, more vigorous desire of love’s happiness—but this does not make their passions more trivial nor less consuming. ”

“ If any pleasure, any even which resulted from affection for others, had drawn her for an instant from what she believed to be the path—and it was always the thorniest path—of self-sacrifice, she would remorselessly denounce that pleasure, and even tear out that affection from her heart. ”

“ Applying these principles to the case of libel, juries were directed that it was for the court to determine whether the publication fell within the definition of libel, and whether the case was one in which malice was to be inferred by construction of law. If the case were one in which malice was inferred by law, the only facts left to the jury were the fact of publication and the meaning averred by innuendoes; they could not go into the question of intention, unless the case were one of privilege, in which express malice had to be proved. ”

“ This kind of Behaviour banish’d part of her Sufferings, for tho’ she cou’d consider both his, and her own Passion in no other View, than that of a very great Misfortune to them both, yet there are so many Pleasures, even in the Pains of Love. Such tender thrillings, such Soul-ravishing Amusements, attend some happy Moments of Contemplation, that those who most Endeavour, can wish but faintly to be freed from. ”

“ And now her lips had touched his again and again and somehow between kiss and kiss, she was murmuring, "Oh, I love you—I love you—I love you. I love you so much that life without you is a perfect misery. ”

“ Listen, in order to feel all, all the pleasure that I can give you, you must forget yourself for an instant, lose yourself, melt into one thought only, the thought of sensual love, of fleshly rapture and mad delight. No matter what way I may attack you, no matter with what rage and force, you must not budge or give an answering movement. Lie quite still and receive my caresses and kisses without returning them. ”

“ Divine Engadine, beloved, adored, blessed by all those who have discovered the face of love and perhaps of happiness. While the pleasure-seekers forgetfully left her without regret, seeking other surroundings with other pleasures, with an inextinguishable thirst that inundated the hearts and souls, while the snobs left without understanding anything, diseased with snobbishness as they were, and anxious to find other circles where they could abandon themselves to their ridiculous infirmity ”

“ To love, without obtaining love in return! What would become of him if such a misfortune befell him? He could not think of it without a kind of distraction, so long as the young woman was mistress of his heart and mind. ”

“ Such is the tenderness, such the intensity of the love of innocence. It has for ever existed, and will for ever exist,—from Eve, on the first day of her creation, to the many whose hearts at this moment beat with affection and love ”

“ It is ever thus with woman! Although, in the moment of just resentment, pride and anger may for a while check the flow of affection, and harden the wounded heart as if bound about with bands of steel, yet love will return again, dissolve these bands, and convert resentment into tenderness. ”

“ Fatal passion! Have you yourself never felt its force? Is it possible that you, with the same blood in your veins that flows in mine, should have passed through life unscathed by the same excitements? Love has rendered me perhaps foolishly tender—too easily excited—too impassioned—too faithful, and probably too indulgent to the desires and caprices, or, if you will, the faults of an adored mistress. ”

“ And for an idle, silly flirtation, masquerade of hearts, a flower or two, a hand pressure, a conservatory-set scene to flatter a woman's vanity—oh, have the worst! a kiss to flutter a man's pulse—for that you threw me over, let me go through that damnation without one sign? ”

“ Without hesitation, the outcast bent her face, purified and celestial with love and sacrifice; bent it over the dreadful Thing, loathsome and decaying, beyond the semblance of human form or feature, on the bed,—bent and kissed, as a mother would have kissed. ”

“ A train of combustible feelings were lighted up in me, and my soul was all tenderness and passion. Never was youth more completely love-sick, though as yet it was a mere general sentiment, and wanted a definite object. Unfortunately, our neighborhood was particularly deficient in female society, and I languished in vain for some divinity to whom I might offer up this most uneasy burden of affections. ”

“ For call it Love as they will, it is naught but Lust, as low an instinct or habit as that of craving for strong liquor or any wherewithall to still the insatiate demands of uncontrolled appetite. Love hath naught to do with Lust,—for Love is a Principle, not a Passion. ”

“ It is a sufficient answer, that nature has made you to blush when you are guilty of no fault, and has forced us to love you because you do so.—Blushing is so far from being necessarily an attendant on guilt, that it is the usual companion of innocence.
This modesty, which I think so essential in your sex, will naturally dispose you to be rather silent in company, especially in a large one.—People of sense and discernment will never mistake such silence for dulness. One may take a share in conversation without uttering a syllable. ”

“ By and by the good-by kiss is forgotten when he leaves her, the salute of greeting omitted when he returns, and each heart grows harder and harder, bitterer and bitterer, until at last he thinks of her but to censure and condemn, she of him but to dislike and fear. ”

“ If he threw this away, would any other woman be able to inspire him with any sentiment more like love than this passion of memory, regret, tenderness, pity—this desire to hold, protect, and comfort, with which, ever since her tears fell on his hand, he had been fighting in fierce resentment. ”

“ But what pleasure or consolation can the beloved be receiving all this time? Must he not feel the extremity of disgust when he looks at an old shrivelled face and the remainder to match, which even in a description is disagreeable, and quite detestable when he is forced into daily contact with his lover ”

“ Would you rejoice, unchaste man, who have hitherto indulged your foul passions, and by your wicked importunities have seduced many an innocent soul; who still continue to live in unlawful intimacy with one who has captivated your heart in the meshes of impure love? ”

“ The lover fails to understand and sickness creeps upon him, as men sicken of hidden poison. Tell me," he added brutally, leaning toward her, "for who should know better than you? does not the sweetest hour of love hold a drop of bitter? Why do you not restore your lovers to their reason, to the service of the state, to a knowledge of nature?" ”

“ Here, affection sways me; there, it might be prejudice or passion.”
“Ambition!” muttered Mark, catching at the word; “ambition, the penalty you pay for it is far too high; and were the gain certain, it is dearly bought by a heart dead to all purer emotions, cold to every affection of family and kindred, and a spirit made suspecting by treachery. ”

“ What charms him most in their intercourse, and increases his pleasure in the highest degree, is the idea of the intense love she felt for her dead lover, and the abandonment with which she had reposed in his arms. ”

“ Allusion was constantly made to pleasure parties by water and by land, to perils of all kinds with their happy escapes, to balls and evening promenades, to the amusement afforded by ridiculous wooers, and to whatever could excite an uncomfortable jealousy in the heart of an inconsolable lover, who had, as it were, for a long time drawn to himself the sum of so many years. ”

“ It must be the same with the persons who have passed through the abominations of the honeymoon. They do not dare to undeceive their neighbor. And I did the same.
“The felicities of the honeymoon do not exist. On the contrary, it is a period of uneasiness, of shame, of pity, and, above all, of ennui,—of ferocious ennui. It is something like the feeling of a youth when he is beginning to smoke. He desires to vomit; he drivels, and swallows his drivel, pretending to enjoy this little amusement. The vice of marriage . ”

“ The two lovers bending over the reflection of their caress unconsciously figured the mystic power of voluptuous enjoyment, which consists in banishing for a few moments from our souls the unknown man whom we all carry hidden within us, and thus rendering him as remote and strange as a phantom. Does not the dim vagueness of such a sentiment perhaps increase the delirium and produce the terror of lovers who in the mirrors of deep alcoves admire the reflection of their mutual caresses repeated by figures in their own likeness, yet immeasurably unlike and remote in their supernatural silence? ”

“ The more violent and foolish the amorous intoxication, without preparation or reflexion, and the less the individuals know each other, the more rapidly these illusions collapse, like a castle of cards, as soon as some douche of cold water sobers the two lovers. Thus indifference, disgust, and even hatred, follow "love." ”

“ On the wedding day not a few eyes would be wet at the sight of so youthful a man and maiden ‘joined together in an honourable estate, instituted of God in the time of man’s innocency.’ For such ancient traditions—in spite of the fact that man’s innocency could not even survive one bite of an apple shared with a woman—are none the less apt to be deeply moving. ”

“ There is a delight even in the parting agony of two lovers worth a thousand tame pleasures of the world. I have her at this moment before my eyes—at the window of the pavilion, putting aside the vines that clustered about the casement—her light form beaming forth in virgin white—her countenance all tears and smiles—sending a thousand and a thousand adieus after me, as, hesitating, in a delirium of fondness and agitation, I faltered my way down the avenue. ”

“ His agitation increased with every step. Fragments of scenes passed rapidly before him like the phantasmagoria of a dream—a bit of country, a glimpse of the sea, a flight of steps among the roses, the interior of a room, all the places in which some sentiment had had its birth, round which she had diffused some sweetness, where she had breathed the charm of her person. ”

“ That she had once loved the man,—if, indeed, the romantic, high-strung fancy which had swept over the newly-orphaned girl could be dignified by the name of love,—served but to increase her feeling of shame. ”