Romeo, if dead, should be cut up into little stars to make the heavens
fine. Life, with this pair, has no other aim, asks no more, than
Juliet,—than Romeo. Night, day, studies, talents, kingdoms, religion,
are all contained in this form full of soul, in this soul which is all
form. The lovers delight in endearments, in avowals of love, in
comparisons of their regards. When alone, they solace themselves with
the remembered image of the other. Does that other see the same star,
the same melting cloud, read the same book, feel the same emotion, that
now delight me? They try and weigh their affection, and adding up
costly advantages, friends, opportunities, properties, exult in
discovering that willingly, joyfully, they would give all as a ransom
for the beautiful, the beloved head, not one hair of which shall be
harmed. But the lot of humanity is on these children. Danger, sorrow,
and pain arrive to them, as to all. Love prays. It makes covenants with
Eternal Power in behalf of this dear mate. The union which is thus
effected and which adds a new value to every atom in nature—for it
transmutes every thread throughout the whole web of relation into a
golden ray, and bathes the soul in a new and sweeter element—is yet a
temporary state. Not always can flowers, pearls, poetry, protestations,
nor even home in another heart, content the awful soul that dwells in
clay. It arouses itself at last from these endearments, as toys, and
puts on the harness and aspires to vast and universal aims. The soul
which is in the soul of each, craving a perfect beatitude, detects
incongruities, defects and disproportion in the behavior of the other.
Hence arise surprise, expostulation and pain. Yet that which drew them
to each other was signs of loveliness, signs of virtue; and these
virtues are there, however eclipsed. They appear and reappear and
continue to attract; but the regard changes, quits the sign and
attaches to the substance. This repairs the wounded affection.
Meantime, as life wears on, it proves a game of permutation and
combination of all possible positions of the parties, to employ all the
resources of each and acquaint each with the strength and weakness of
the other. For it is the nature and end of this relation, that they
should represent the human race to each other. All that is in the
world, which is or ought to be known, is cunningly wrought into the
texture of man, of woman:—
“The person love does to us fit,
Like manna, has the taste of all in it.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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