“Entirely too light, and superficial indeed, madam,” said Cromwell; “the author has confined himself wholly to a recital of the crimes which conducted the prince to the throne. The style of that history is very negligent, but, at the same time, very far above that of his other works, and particularly of his _Utopia_, which is a work so extravagant, a political system so impracticable, that I regard the book simply as a wonderful fable, agreeable enough to listen to, but at which one is obliged to laugh afterwards when thinking of the absurdities it contains.” “Your judgment is as invidious as it is false!” exclaimed Lady Rochford, who always expressed her opinions bluntly, and without dissimulation. “If it is true,” she continued, “that this philosophical dream can never be realized, yet it is nevertheless impossible not to admire the wise and virtuous maxims it contains. Above all others there is one I have found so just, and so beautifully conceived, I could wish every young girl capable of teaching it to her future husband. ‘How can it be supposed,’ says the author, ‘that any man of honor and refinement could resolve to abandon a virtuous woman, who had been the companion of his bosom, and in whose society he had passed so many days of happiness; only because time, at whose touch all things fade, had laid his destroying hand upon the lovely features of that gentle wife, once so cherished and adored? Because age, which has been the first and most incurable of all the infirmities she has been compelled to drag after her, had forcibly despoiled her of the charming freshness of her youth? Has that husband not enjoyed the flower of her beauty and garnered in the most beautiful days of her life, and will he forsake his wife now because she has become feeble, delicate, and suffering? Shall he become inconstant and perjured at the very moment when her sad condition demands of him a thousand sacrifices, and claims a return to the faithful devotion and vows of his early youth? Ah! into such a depth of unworthiness and degradation we will not presume it possible for any man to descend! It was thus the people of the Utopian Isle reasoned, declaring it would be the height of injustice and barbarity to abandon one whom we had loved and cherished, and who had been so devoted to us, at the moment when suffering and affliction demanded of us renewed sympathy and a generous increase of our tenderest care and consolations!’[44] And now, my dear sister,” she added, fixing her eyes steadfastly on Lady Boleyn, “what do you think of that passage? Are you not forcibly struck by the truth and justice of the sentiment? Let me advise you when you marry to be well satisfied beforehand that your husband entertains the same opinions.”