and so you ask your old aunt for advice; you must consider her
quite an expert. I don't know as much as you think I do, and yet I am not
entirely ignorant of the art of loving, or, rather, of making one's self
loved, in which you are a little lacking. I can admit that at my age.

You say that you are all attention, love, kisses and caresses for him.
Perhaps that is the very trouble; I think you kiss him too much.

My dear, we have in our hands the most terrible power in the world: LOVE.

Man is gifted with physical strength, and he exercises force. Woman is
gifted with charm, and she rules with caresses. It is our weapon,
formidable and invincible, but we should know how to use it.

Know well that we are the mistresses of the world! To tell the history of
Love from the beginning of the world would be to tell the history of man
himself: Everything springs from it, the arts, great events, customs,
wars, the overthrow of empires.

In the Bible you find Delila, Judith; in fables we find Omphale, Helen;
in history the Sabines, Cleopatra and many others.

Therefore we reign supreme, all-powerful. But, like kings, we must make
use of delicate diplomacy.

Love, my dear, is made up of imperceptible sensations. We know that it is
as strong as death, but also as frail as glass. The slightest shock
breaks it, and our power crumbles, and we are never able to raise it
again.

We have the power of making ourselves adored, but we lack one tiny thing,
the understanding of the various kinds of caresses. In embraces we lose
the sentiment of delicacy, while the man over whom we rule remains master
of himself, capable of judging the foolishness of certain words. Take
care, my dear; that is the defect in our armor. It is our Achilles' heel.

Do you know whence comes our real power? From the kiss, the kiss alone!
When we know how to hold out and give up our lips we can become queens.

The kiss is only a preface, however, but a charming preface. More
charming than the realization itself. A preface which can always be read
over again, whereas one cannot always read over the book.

Yes, the meeting of lips is the most perfect, the most divine sensation
given to human beings, the supreme limit of happiness: It is in the kiss
alone that one sometimes seems to feel this union of souls after which we
strive, the intermingling of hearts, as it were.

Do you remember the verses of Sully-Prudhomme:

Caresses are nothing but anxious blis