Horwicz places the essence of Conjugal Love in the feeling of being
indissolubly united; and this agrees substantially with our conclusion
that it lies in a necessary mutual Sympathy concerning every affair of
vital interest. Now if this _obligato_ Sympathy is facilitated by a
communion of tastes, as just suggested, there is no reason why conjugal
life should not retain some of the other elements which constitute the
charm of Romantic Love. Novelists and dramatists will perhaps continue
to avoid wedded life as a theme because it lacks the plot-interest, the
uncertainty, and the consequent Mixed Moods of pre-nuptial Love.
Emotional Hyperbole, too, will rarely survive the honeymoon, for, as
Addison remarks, “When a man becomes familiar with his goddess, she
quickly sinks into a woman.” Yet a woman, too, is not such a bad thing
after all, if you know how to manage her. Jealousy is a trait of
Romantic Love that is only too apt to survive in marriage. By a
judicious use of its sting a neglected wife can bring her husband back
to her feet. But it is a double-edged tool, dangerous to toy with. The
Pride of Conquest becomes changed into Pride of Possession or a vain
feeling of Proprietorship, which will continue so long as the husband or
the wife retains those self-sacrificing qualities which distinguished
them during Courtship—which, however, rarely happens. Where possession
is assured and sanctioned by law, Coyness is of course out of the
question; yet a clever woman can by a judicious adaptation of the arts
of Flirtation do much to keep alive the glowing coals of former romantic
passion. All she has to do is to devise some novel methods of
fascinating the husband, and then keep him at a distance till he resumes
the tricks of devoted Gallantry which had once made him such an
acceptable lover.
It is the growing indifference to Gallantry, to the Desire to Please,
active and passive, that is responsible for the usual absence of romance
in conjugal life. And there seems to be a general ungallant consensus
among writers, masculine and feminine, that women are more responsible
for this state of affairs than men. “The reason,” says Swift, “why so
few marriages are happy, is because young ladies spend their time in
making nets, not in making cages.” Young ladies have, no doubt, greatly
improved since the days of Swift; but in the vast majority of cases
their device still is to learn a few superficial tricks of “culture,”
and to practise the art of personal adornment, until they have caught a
husband, and then to bid good-bye to all music, and art, and study, and
improvement of the mind, as well as to the “bother” of attending to
Personal Beauty while the husband _only_ is about. As if it were not a
thousand times more important to retain the husband’s romantic adoration
and Gallantry, originally based on that beauty, than to enjoy the
momentary admiration of a third person!
On this topic the German poet Bodenstedt has some remarks which show
that, after all, the excessive Oriental Jealousy which forbids women to
appear unveiled in public rests on a basis of common sense:—
“Just as it is possible to trace most absurdities to an originally quite
reasonable idea, so not a few things may be said in favour of the
Oriental custom which allows women to adorn themselves only for their
husband, and to unveil their face only before him, while outside of the
house it is their duty to appear veiled and in as unattractive a costume
as possible. With us, it is well known, the opposite is true: at home
the women devote little attention to their toilet, and only adorn
themselves when they have company or go out visiting; in one word, they
display their charms and their finery more to please others than their
own husband,” etc.
Surely no one wishes our women to reserve their charms exclusively for
their husbands. On the contrary, such a proceeding would be considered
quite as unreasonable and selfish as to lock up a Titian or a Murillo in
a room accessible to a single person only; but certainly the husband
should not be entirely overlooked in his wife’s Desire to Please by her
Personal Beauty. His Pride on seeing others admire her does not alone
suffice to prolong his romantic adoration. Don’t be too sure, Amanda,
that your husband is yours because you are married. He is yours in Law,
but not in Love, unless you preserve your personal charms in his
presence.
The fact that, whereas in Romantic Love men are superior to women; in
conjugal life, on the other hand, woman’s love is commonly much deeper
and more lasting than man’s, indicates in itself that marriages are made
or marred by women. (For the sake of the lovely alliteration some
writers would have said—against their conscience—that “marriages are
made or marred by men;” but alliteration will have to be ignored in this
place in favour of facts.) Before marriage, women are more beautiful and
fascinating than men, wherefore men love them more ardently than _they_
love the men. After marriage, it is the men who grow more beautiful,
more manly, in body as well as in mind; hence it is but natural that
their wives should love them more and more. So would wives be loved more
and more if they did not so soon after thirty lose their physical
charms, without trying, by reading books or at least the newspapers, to
make themselves intellectual companions of their husbands, able to
converse interestingly on various topics.
The old excuse that motherhood inevitably lessens woman’s charms is all
nonsense. Married women at thirty are almost always handsomer than old
maids of thirty. Women grow stout and clumsy, or thin and faded so soon,
not because they are mothers, but because they are indifferent to the
laws of health; because they refuse to go out to get fresh air and
exercise, which would preserve the freshness of their complexion, the
graceful contours of their bodies, and the elasticity of their gait. The
morbid fondness for a hot-house atmosphere, and the horror of fresh air,
draughts, and vigorous exercise, have done more to shorten man’s Love
and woman’s Beauty than all other causes combined. _The road to lasting
Love is paved with lasting Beauty._
Inasmuch as Conjugal Affection was not—as might be naturally
supposed—historically developed from Romantic Love, since it existed
long before Romantic Love, the peculiarities of this later passion are
not normally present in Conjugal Love. To what extent, however, they can
be smuggled in, has just been shown; and it is one of the great social
tasks of the future to make Conjugal and Romantic Love as much alike as
possible: not by making the poetry of romance more prosaic, but by
making the prose of conjugal life more poetic. But so long as Romantic
Love is discouraged, Conjugal Affection, too, will of course be unable
to borrow its unique charms. Hence an additional reason for facilitating
the opportunities for Courtship and prolonging its duration.