Produced by Turgut Dincer, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) THE THREAD OF LIFE [Illustration: Infanta Eulalia of Spain; signature] THE THREAD OF LIFE BY H.R.H. THE INFANTA EULALIA OF SPAIN WITH A REMBRANDT PHOTOGRAVURE FRONTISPIECE, FOUR FULL-PAGE PLATES, AND A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR AND HER BOOK CASSELL AND COMPANY, LTD. London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne 1912 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED PREFACE Some preface, however short, is needed to this book, the mirror of some of my ideas, and, first of all, I wish to put my readers on their guard against a false interpretation of the motives by which I have been actuated. In publishing these opinions of mine, it has not been my wish to accomplish a literary work. I have not aimed at any display of learning, and I make no pretence of forcing on anyone my different points of view. As a spectator in close enough contact with present social problems to understand all the points under discussion, yet at the same time sufficiently removed from them to analyse them coolly and judge them without prejudice, I bring forward my evidence unshackled by conventions. It has seemed to me that such fair, exact evidence might interest those who seek to glean, amongst all classes of society, the thousand dissimilar and contradictory elements whence proceed the lessons needed both for the present and the future. Those who care to glance through the short chapters of this book will soon see that they have been written with the sincere conviction with which I always express my ideas and opinions, or perform any work independently undertaken. I only ask my readers to excuse any faults of style, which I have tried to make up for by straightforwardness of tone. EULALIA Infanta of Spain CONTENTS PAGE GENERAL CAUSES OF HAPPINESS 3 THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL 11 HONESTY 19 FRIENDSHIP 25 DIVORCE 33 THE FAMILY 45 THE COMPLETE INDEPENDENCE OF WOMAN 53