WHAT IS ITS QUALITY, AND SCARCELY THAT IT EXISTS. That
there exists such conjugial love as is described in the following pages,
may indeed be acknowledged from the first state of that love, when it
insinuates itself, and enters into the hearts of a youth and a virgin;
thus from its influence on those who begin to love one alone of the sex,
and to desire to be joined therewith in marriage; and still more at the
time of courtship and the interval which precedes the marriage-ceremony;
and lastly during the marriage-ceremony and some days after it. At such
times who does not acknowledge and consent to the following positions;
that this love is the foundation of all loves, and also that into it are
collected all joys and delights from first to last? And who does not
know that, after this season of pleasure, the satisfactions thereof
successively pass away and depart, till at length they are scarcely
sensible? In the latter case, if it be said as before, that this love is
the foundation of all loves, and that into it are collected all joys and
delights, the positions are neither agreed to nor acknowledged, and
possibly it is asserted that they are nonsense or incomprehensible
mysteries. From these considerations it is evident, that primitive
marriage love bears a resemblance to love truly conjugial, and presents
it to view in a certain image. The reason of which is, because then the
love of the sex, which is unchaste, is put away, and in its place the
love of one of the sex, which is truly conjugial and chaste, remains
implanted: in this case, who does not regard other women with
indifference, and the one to whom he is united with love and affection?

59. The reason why love truly conjugial is notwithstanding so rare, that
its quality is not known, and scarcely its existence, is, because the
state of pleasurable gratifications before and at the time of marriage,
is afterwards changed into a state of indifference arising from an
insensibility to such gratifications. The causes of this change of state
are too numerous to be here adduced; but they shall be adduced in a
future part of this work, when we come to explain in their order the
causes of coldnesses, separations, and divorces; from which it will be
seen, that with the generality at this day this image of conjugial love
is so far abolished, and with the image the knowledge thereof, that its
quality and even its existence are scarcely known. It is well known,
that every man