te always to be followed by some injurious act?
If we are guilty, is it the right of him who has profited by our
faults, who is the cause of them, to punish us?

Always maintain for the Countess the sentiments you have expressed in
her regard. Do not permit a false opinion to interfere with the
progress which they can still make in your heart. It is not our defeat
alone which should render us despicable in your eyes. The manner in
which we have been defended, delivered, and guarded, ought to be the
only measure of your disdain.

So Madame de La Fayette is of the opinion that my last letter is based
upon rather a liberal foundation? You see where your indiscretions
lead me. But she does not consider that I am no more guilty than a
demonstrator of anatomy. I analyse the metaphysical man as he dissects
the physical one. Do you believe that out of regard to scruples he
should omit in his operations those portions of his subject which
might offer corrupted minds occasions to draw sallies out of an ill
regulated imagination? It is not the essence of things that causes
indecency; it is not the words, or even the ideas, it is the intent of
him who utters them, and the depravity of him who listens. Madame de
La Fayette was certainly the last woman in the world whom I would have
suspected of reproaching me in that manner, and to-morrow, at the
Countess', I will make her confess her injustice.

XLVII

Cause of Quarrels Among Rivals

What, I, Marquis, astonished at the new bickerings of your moneyed
woman? Do not doubt for an instant that she employs all the
refinements of coquetry to take you away from the Countess. She may
have a liking for you, but moderate your amour propre so far as that
is concerned, for the most powerful motive of her conduct, is, without
contradiction, the desire for revenge. Her vanity is interested in
punishing her rival for having obtained the preference.

Women never pardon such a thing as that, and if he who becomes the
subject of the quarrel is not the first object of their anger, it is
because they need him to display their resentment. You have
encountered in the rival of the Countess precisely what you exacted
from her to strengthen your attachment. You are offered in advance the
price of the attentions you devote to her, and from which you will
soon be dispensed, and I think you will have so little delicacy as to
accept them. It is written across the heart of every man: "To the
easi