The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Physiology of Marriage, Part III.
by Honore de Balzac

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Title: The Physiology of Marriage, Part III.

Author: Honore de Balzac

Release Date: July 4, 2005 [EBook #5958]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PHYSIOLOGY OF MARRIAGE ***

Produced by Dagny; and John Bickers

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF MARRIAGE

THIRD PART

BY

HONORE DE BALZAC

RELATING TO CIVIL WAR.

"Lovely as the seraphs of Klopstock,
Terrible as the devils of Milton."
--DIDEROT.

MEDITATION XXIII.

OF MANIFESTOES.

The Preliminary precepts, by which science has been enabled at this
point to put weapons into the hand of a husband, are few in number; it
is not of so much importance to know whether he will be vanquished, as
to examine whether he can offer any resistance in the conflict.

Meanwhile, we will set up here certain beacons to light up the arena
where a husband is soon to find himself, in alliance with religion and
law, engaged single-handed in a contest with his wife, who is
supported by her native craft and the whole usages of society as her
allies.

LXXXII.
Anything may be expected and anything may be supposed of a woman who
is in love.

LXXXIII.
The actions of a woman who intends to deceive her husband are almost
always the result of study, but never dictated by reason.

LXXXIV.
The greater number of women advance like the fleas, by erratic leaps
and bounds, They owe their escape to the height or depth of their
first ideas, and any interruption of their plans rather favors their
execution. But they operate only within a narrow area which it is easy
for the husband to make still narrower; and if he keeps cool he will
end by extinguishing this piece of living saltpetr