r, as long as the daughter
is a mere girl, comes to cross purposes with her when they are both
women together.

"It is your happiness which I want, so listen to my words. The love
which you now feel is that of a young girl, and is natural to us all,
for it is woman's destiny to cling to a man. Unhappily, pretty one,
there is but one man in the world for a woman! And sometimes this man,
whom fate has marked out for us, is not the one whom we, mistaking a
passing fancy for love, choose as husband. Strange as what I say may
appear to you, it is worth noting. If we cannot love the man we have
chosen, the fault is not exclusively ours, it lies with both, or
sometimes with circumstances over which we have no control. Yet there is
no reason why the man chosen for us by our family, the man to whom our
fancy has gone out, should not be the man whom we can love. The barriers
which arise later between husband and wife are often due to lack of
perseverance on both sides. The task of transforming a husband into a
lover is not less delicate than that other task of making a husband
of the lover, in which you have just proved yourself marvelously
successful.

"I repeat it, your happiness is my object. Never allow yourself, then,
to forget that the first three months of your married life may work
your misery if you do not submit to the yoke with the same forbearance,
tenderness, and intelligence that you have shown during the days of
courtship. For, my little rogue, you know very well that you have
indulged in all the innocent pleasures of a clandestine love affair. If
the culmination of your love begins with disappointment, dislike, nay,
even with pain, well, come and tell me about it. Don't hope for too much
from marriage at first; it will perhaps give you more discomfort than
joy. The happiness of your life requires at least as patient cherishing
as the early shoots of love.

"To conclude, if by chance you should lose the lover, you will find in
his place the father of your children. In this, my dear child, lies the
whole secret of social life. Sacrifice everything to the man whose name
you bear, the man whose honor and reputation cannot suffer in the least
degree without involving you in frightful consequences. Such sacrifice
is thus not only an absolute duty for women of our rank, it is also
their wisest policy. This, indeed, is the distinctive mark of great
moral principles, that they hold good and are expedient from whatever