At the same time it would be a great mistake to assume that the
manifestation of mixed moods proves the presence of romantic love.
After all, the alternation of hope and despair which produces those
bitter-sweet paradoxes of the varying and mixed emotions, is one of
the _selfish_ aspects of passion: the lover fears or hopes for
_himself_, not for the other. There is, therefore, no reason why we
should not read of troubled or ecstatic lovers in the poems of the
ancient writers, who, while knowing love only as selfish lust,
nevertheless had sufficient imagination to suffer the agonies of
thwarted purpose and the delights of realized hopes. As a boat-load of
shipwrecked sailors, hungry and thirsty, may be switched from deadly
despair to frantic joy by the approach of a rescuing vessel, so may a
man change his moods who is swayed by what is, next to hunger and
thirst, the most powerful and imperious of all appetites. We must not,
therefore, make the reckless assumption that the Greek and Sanscrit
writers must have known romantic love, because they describe men and
women as being prostrated or elated by strong passion. When Euripides
speaks of love as being both delectable and painful; when Sappho and
Theocritus note the pallor, the loss of sleep, the fears and tears of
lovers; when Achilles Tatius makes his lover exclaim, at sight of
Leucippe: "I was overwhelmed by conflicting feelings: admiration,
astonishment, agitation, shame, assurance;" when King Pururavas, in
the Hindoo drama, _Urvasi_ is tormented by doubts as to whether his
love is reciprocated by the celestial Bayadère (apsara); when, in
_Malati_, a love-glance is said to be "anointed with nectar and
poison;" when the arrows of the Hindoo gods of love are called hard,
though made of flowers; burning, though not in contact with the skin;
voluptuous, though piercing--when we come across such symptoms and
fancies we have no right as yet to infer the existence of romantic
love; for all these things also characterize sensual passion, which is
love only in the sense of _self_-love, whereas, romantic love is
affection for _another_--a distinction which will be made more and
more manifest as we proceed in our discussion of the ingredients of
love, especially the last seven, which are altruistic. It is only when
we find these altruistic ingredients associated with the hopes and
fears and mixed moods that we can speak of romantic love. The symptoms
referred to in this paragraph tell us about selfish longings, selfish
pleasures and selfish pains, but nothing whatever about affection for
the person who is so eagerly coveted.