Who that has suffered much from love of woman would not willingly pay double the price in heart-aches to buy back “love’s young dream?” For my own part, I would sooner be miserable in love than happy out of it; but then there are those with whom to love is as necessary as to breathe. I am not ashamed to confess it is so with me, for is not love the most beautiful element in life? Nor have I any sympathy with those cynical-minded persons who regard absolute devotion to a woman as feebly foolish. Though bachelorhood has become almost chronic with me, I still never meet a woman without wondering whether she and I could love each other under appropriate circumstances. And surely it is this capacity to give and take in the matter of the affections that preserves our youth for us; while we retain it, we can never grow old, though our years may increase apace. When we feel that we are open to no new sensations of love, then let us prepare for old age, and turn an indifferent ear to the sound of funeral bells. But while one can say, “What a charming woman; I believe I could love her,” one feels that life is still worth living, and full of beautiful possibilities. It has been a fashion in all ages to decry women, to call them false and fickle, to say that their business is to deceive, that their spell is that of the serpent, that they are vain and shallow and cruel. Poets have railed against them in plausible verse; philosophers have said bitter things about them; and many a wit has gained his reputation at the expense of woman’s fame; all of which is as wickedly foolish as to say that human nature is uniformly infamous. You will not find that the great writers who live in the hearts of mankind ever stultified or debased their genius by defaming woman; but, on the contrary, they have created for us immortal types of pure and lovely womanhood. It is the cheapest cynicism to discredit a whole sex; and misogyny and misanthropy are merely the affectations of vain and egotistical minds. When I hear a man say he does not believe in woman’s constancy or woman’s virtue, I know that there is something wrong with that man: he is either a libertine or a bully, and no woman will ever respect him, however much he may ensnare her senses.