u tremble with the shock: "Alone. Alone. Be
alone, my soul." And if the servant smashes three electric-light bulbs
in three minutes, say to her: "How very inconsiderate and careless of
you!" But say to yourself: "Don't hear it, my soul. Don't take fright
at the pop of a light-bulb."

Husbands, don't love your wives any more. If they flirt with men
younger or older than yourselves, let your blood not stir. If you can
go away, go away. But if you must stay and see her, then say to her,
"I would rather you didn't flirt in my presence, Eleanora." Then, when
she goes red and loosens torrents of indignation, don't answer any
more. And when she floods into tears, say quietly in your own self,
"My soul is my own"; and go away, be alone as much as possible. And
when she works herself up, and says she must have love or she will
die, then say: "Not my love, however." And to all her threats, her
tears, her entreaties, her reproaches, her cajolements, her
winsomenesses, answer nothing, but say to yourself: "Shall I be
implicated in this display of the love-will? Shall I be blasted by
this false lightning?" And though you tremble in every fiber, and feel
sick, vomit-sick with the scene, still contain yourself, and say, "My
soul is my own. It shall not be violated." And learn, learn, learn the
one and only lesson worth learning at last. Learn to walk in the
sweetness of the possession of your own soul. And whether your wife
weeps as she takes off her amber beads at night, or whether your
neighbor in the train sits in your coat bottoms, or whether your
superior in the office makes supercilious remarks, or your inferior is
familiar and impudent; or whether you read in the newspaper that Lloyd
George is performing another iniquity, or the Germans plotting another
plot, say to yourself: "My soul is my own. My soul is with myself, and
beyond implication." And wait, quietly, in possession of your own
soul, till you meet another man who has made the choice, and kept it.
Then you will know him by the look on his face: half a dangerous look,
a look of Cain, and half a look of gathered beauty. Then you two will
make the nucleus of a new society--Ooray! Bis! Bis!!

But if you should never meet such a man: and if your wife should
torture you every day with her love-will: and even if she should force
herself into a consumption, like Catherine Linton in "Wuthering
Heights," owing to her obstinate and determined love-will (which is
quite another m