here were, in this century, superior women in whom was exhibited a
high form of love, but who realized that perfect love was impossible
in their age; yet they desired to be loved in an intense and
legitimate manner. This phase of womanhood is well represented by
Mlle. Aisse and Mlle. de Lespinasse, both of whom felt an irresistible
need of loving; they proclaimed their love and not only showed
themselves to be capable of loving and of intense suffering, but
proved themselves worthy of love which, in its highest form, they felt
to be an unknown quantity at that time. Their love became a constant
inspiration, a model of devotion, almost a transfiguration of passion.
These women were products of the time; they had to be, to
compensate for the general sterility and barrenness, to equalize the
inequalities, and to pay the tribute of vice and debauch.

All the customs of the age were arrayed against pure womanhood and
offered it nothing but temptation. Inasmuch as the husband belonged
to court and to war more than to domestic felicity, he left his wife
alone for long periods. The husbands themselves seemed actually to
enjoy the infidelity of their wives and were often intimate friends of
their wives' lovers; and it was no rare thing that when the wife found
no pleasure in lovers, she did not concern herself about her husband's
mistresses (unless they were intolerably disagreeable to her), often
advising the mistress as to the best method of winning her husband.

It must be admitted that this separation in marriage, this reciprocity
of liberty, this absolute tolerance, was not a phase of the eighteenth
century marriage, but was the very character of it. In earlier times,
in the sixteenth century, infidelity was counted as such and caused
trouble in the household. If the husband abused his privileges, the
wife was obliged to bear the insult in silence, being helpless to
avenge it. If she imitated his actions, it was under the gravest
dangers to her own life and that of her lover. The honor of the
husband was closely attached to the virtue of the wife; thus, if
he sought diversion elsewhere, and his wife fell victim to the
fascinations of another, he was ridiculed. Marriage was but an
external bond; in the eighteenth century, it was a bond only as long
as husband and wife had affection for one another; when that no
longer existed, they frankly told each other and sought that emotion
elsewhere; they ceased to be lovers and becam