that nothing can ever be as it was, that as
mankind by living decays, the emotions and outlook must change; to have
had a delight is a deadly thing, for one wants it again, just as it was,
as a child demands always the same story. It must be the same delight,
and none who feel emotion will ever understand that "the race of
delights is short and pleasures have mutable faces."

It is true that early joys may unite, especially if one can believe that
there is only one fountain of joy. I think of many cases,--M 5, M
33,--where there is only one cry: "It is cruel to have had delights, for
the glamour of the past makes the day darker." They will live to see the
past differently when they are older and the present matters less. But
until then, the dead joy poisons the animate present; the man must drift
away to his occupation, for there is nothing else, and the woman must
harden by wanting what she cannot have. She will part herself from him
more thoroughly by hardening, for one cannot count upon a woman's
softness; it can swiftly be transmuted into malicious hatred.

3

This picture of pain is the rule where two strangers wed, but there are
some who, taking a partner discover a friend, many who develop agreeable
acquaintanceship. Passion may be diverted into a common interest, say in
conchology; if people are not too stupid, not too egotistic, they very
soon discover in each other a little of the human good will that will
not die. They must, or they fail. For whereas in the beginning foolish
lips may be kissed, a little later they must learn to speak some wisdom.
In this men are most exacting; they are most inclined to demand that
women should hold up to their faces the mirror of flattery, while women
seem more tolerant, often because they do not understand, very often
because they do not care, and echo the last words of Mr. Bernard Shaw's
Ann: "Never mind her, dear, go on talking;" perhaps because they have
had to tolerate so much in the centuries that they have grown expert.
One may, however, tolerate whilst strongly disapproving, and one must
disapprove when one's egotism is continually insulted by the other
party's egotism. There is very little room for twice "I" in what ought
to have been "We", and we nearly all feel that the axis of the earth
passes through our bodies. So the common interests of two egotisms can
alone make of these one egotism. The veriest trifle will serve, and pray
do not smile at Case M 4, who f