with him as long as he does
not run away. Let us inquire further into this: In what class do you
find abandoned females? In that where they have not sufficient wealth
or happiness constantly to provide themselves with the obstacles which
have saved you; in that, where men have attacked their virtue with
more audacity, more facility, more frequency, and more impunity, and
consequently with more advantages of every sort; in that, where the
impressions of education, of example, of pride, the desire of a
satisfactory establishment could not sustain them. Two doors below,
there is a woman whom you hate and despise. And in spite of the
outside aid which sustains that virtue, of which you are so proud, in
two days you might be more despicable than she, because you will have
had greater helps to guarantee you against misfortune. I am not
seeking to deprive you of the merit of your virtue, nor am I
endeavoring to prevent you from attaching too much importance to it;
by convincing you of its fragility, I wish to obtain from you only a
trifle of indulgence for those whom a too impetuous inclination, or
the misfortunes of circumstances have precipitated into a position so
humiliating in their own eyes; my sole object is to make you
understand that you ought to glorify yourself less in the possession
of an advantage which you do not owe to yourself, and of which you may
be deprived to-morrow."

She was going to continue, but some one interrupted us. Soon
afterward, I learned by my own experience that I should not have had
so good an opinion of many virtues which had been formerly imposed
upon me, beginning with my own.

XXVI

Love Demands Freedom of Action

I have been of the same opinion as you, Marquis, although the ideas I
communicated to you yesterday appeared to be true speculatively, that
it would be dangerous if all women were to be guided by them. It is
not by a knowledge of their frailty, that women will remain virtuous,
but by the conviction that they are free and mistresses of themselves
when it comes to yield or to resist. Is it by persuading a soldier
that he will be vanquished that he is goaded into fighting with
courage? Did you not notice that the woman who did the talking as I
have related in my last letter, had a personal interest in maintaining
her system? It is true, that when we examine her reasoning according
to the rules of philosophy, it does seem to be a trifle specious, but
it is to be feared