“The
love, born of beauty was not mine; I had
nothing in common with it: I could not dare
to meddle with it, but another love,
venturing diffidently into life after long
acquaintance, furnace-tried by pain,
stamped by constancy, consolidated by
affection’s pure and durable alloy,
submitted by intellect to intellect’s
own tests, and finally wrought up, by his
own process, to his own unflawed
completeness, this Love that laughed at
Passion, his fast frenzies and his hot and
hurried extinction, in this Love I had a
vested interest; and whatever tended either
to its culture or its destruction, I could
not view impassibly.”
…
Lucy Snowe
Villette
