and unhappy, and she is treated by the wretch to whom she gives her money as she treats the fool who gives his money to her; she has no love for either.  It would be sweet to lie generous towards one we love, if that did not make a bargain of love.  I know only one way of gratifying this desire with the woman one loves without embittering love; it is to bestow our all upon her and to live at her expense.  It remains to be seen whether there is any woman with regard to whom such conduct would not be unwise.

He who said, “Lais is mine, but I am not hers,” was talking nonsense.  Possession which is not mutual is nothing at all; at most it is the possession of the sex not of the individual.  But where there is no morality in love, why make such ado about the rest?  Nothing is so easy to find.  A muleteer is in this respect as near to happiness as a millionaire.

Oh, if we could thus trace out the unreasonableness of vice, how often should we find that, when it has attained its object, it discovers it is not what it seemed!  Why is there this cruel haste to corrupt innocence, to make, a victim of a young creature whom we ought to protect, one who is dragged by this first false step into a gulf of misery from which only death can release her?  Brutality, vanity, folly, error, and nothing more.  This pleasure itself is unnatural; it rests on popular opinion, and popular opinion at its worst, since it depends on scorn of self.  He who knows he is the basest of men fears comparison with others, and would be the first that he may be less hateful.  See if those who are most greedy in pursuit of such fancied pleasures are ever attractive young men—­men worthy of pleasing, men who might have some excuse if they were hard to please.  Not so; any one with good looks, merit, and feeling has little fear of his mistress’ experience; with well-placed confidence he says to her, “You know what pleasure is, what is that to me? my heart assures me that this is not so.”

But an aged satyr, worn out with debauchery, with no charm, no consideration, no thought for any but himself, with no shred of honour, incapable and unworthy of finding favour in the eyes of any woman who knows anything of men deserving of love, expects to make up for all this with an innocent girl by trading on her inexperience and stirring her emotions for the first time.  His last hope is to find favour as a novelty; no doubt this is the secret motive of this desire; but he is mistaken, the horror he excites is just as natural as the desires he wishes to arouse.  He is also mistaken in his foolish attempt; that very nature takes care to assert her rights; every girl who sells herself is no longer a maid; she has given herself to the man of her choice, and she is making the very comparison he dreads.  The pleasure purchased is imaginary, but none the less hateful.