to do a similar thing for her. You
could, if you wanted to. But it is a good deal of trouble, and you are
generally tired. But what do you suppose would happen if you should
exhibit the same eagerness that she does to keep the flame of love
alive, so that your marriage should not sink to the dead commonplace
level of all the other marriages you know? Suppose, even after you
have caught the car, that you occasionally got off and ran beside it a
while, just for healthful exercise, and to keep yourself from growing
ordinary?

Suppose _you_ occasionally hunted out a new book, and marked it, and
brought it home to read to her, not because you think she wouldn't
have got it without you, but just to show her that you are trying to
pull evenly, and that you wanted to do something extra charming for
her _in her line_, and to prove that you have a conscience about
keeping this precious, evanescent, but carelessly treated love at a
point where it is still a joy. It is a sad thing to get so used to a
beautiful exception like love that you never think of it as
marvellous.

A man never seems to be able to understand that, in order to obtain
the supremest pleasure from an act of thoughtfulness to his wife, he
must be wholly unselfish and give it to her, in her line, and the way
she wants it--and the way he knows she wants it, if he would only stop
to think. I know a man who hates to go out in the evening, but who
occasionally, in order to do something particularly sweet and
unselfish to please his wife, takes her to the theatre. She loves fine
plays, tragedy, high-grade comedy. But he takes her to the minstrels,
because that is the only thing he can stand, and for two weeks
afterwards he keeps saying to her, "Didn't I take you to the theatre
the other night, honey? Don't I sometimes sacrifice myself for your
pleasure?" And she goes and kisses him and says yes, and tries not to
think that his selfishness more than outweighs his unselfishness.
Women have more conscience about deceiving themselves into staying in
love than men have.

But even yet, suppose you are not that kind of a man, we have not got
to the point of the subject yet. Our way lies through the head to the
heart. And the man who is scrupulously careful about acts has yet to.
watch at once the greatest joy, the greatest grief, the supremest
healing of even deliberate wounds--words. It is a question with me
whether a woman ever knows all the joys of love-making who has o