not be cut asunder. But this failure, temporary as it is
doubtless destined to be, will work for good if it is the point of
departure for a revival among men of the art of love.

Men indeed have here fallen behind women. The old saying, so tediously
often quoted, concerning love as a "thing apart" in the lives of men
would scarcely have occurred to a medieval poet of Provence or Florence.
It is not enough for women to proclaim a new avatar of love if men are
not ready and eager to learn its art and to practise its discipline. In
a profoundly suggestive fragment on love, left incomplete at his death
by the distinguished sociologist Tarde,[89] he suggests that when
masculine energy dies down in the fields of political ambition and
commercial gain, as it already has in the field of warfare, the energy
liberated by greater social organization and cohesion may find scope
once more in love. For too long a period love, like war and politics and
commerce, has been chiefly monopolized by the predatory type of man, in
this field symbolized by the figure of Don Juan. In the future, Tarde
suggests, the Don Juan type of lover may fall into disrepute, giving
place to the Virgilian type, for whom love is not a thing apart but a
form of life embodying its best and highest activities.

When we come upon utterances of this kind we are tempted to think that
they represent merely the poetic dreams of individuals, standing too far
ahead of their fellows to possess any significance for men and women in
general. But it is probable that Ovid, and certain that Dante, set forth
erotic conceptions that were unintelligible to most of their
contemporaries, yet they have been immensely influential over the ideas
and emotions of men in later ages. The poets and prophets of one
generation are engaged in moulding ideals which will be realized in the
lives of a subsequent generation; in expressing their own most intimate
emotions, as it has been truly said, they become the leaders in a long
file of men and women. Whatever may yet be uncertain and undefined, we
may assuredly believe that the emotion of love is far too deeply rooted
in the depth of man's organism and woman's organism ever to be torn out
or ever to be thrust into a subordinate place. And we may also believe
that there is no measurable limit to its power of putting forth ever new
and miraculous flowers. It is recorded that once, in James Hinton's
presence, the conversation turned on music,