Mind of Winter

1 Comment [RSS feed for comments on this post.]

1. From Love, Book I: Concerning the Birth of Love

   by Stendhal (tr. Gilbert and and Suzanne Sale)

   Here is what happens in the soul:

   1. Admiration.

   2. You think, ‘How delightful it would be to kiss her, to be kissed by her,’ and so on…

   3. Hope. You observe her perfections, and it is at this moment that a woman really ought to surrender, for the utmost physical pleasure. Even the most reserved women blush to the whites of their eyes at this moment of hope. The passion is so strong, and the pleasure so sharp, that they betray themselves unmistakably.

   4. Love is born. To love is to enjoy seeing, touching, and sensing with all the senses, as closely as possible, a lovable object which loves in return.

   5. The first crystallization begins. If you are sure that a woman loves you, it is a pleasure to endow her with a thousand perfections and to count your blessings with infinite satisfaction. In the end you overrate wildly, and regard her as something fallen from Heaven, unknown as yet, but certain to be yours.

      Leave a lover with his thoughts for twenty-four hours, and this is what will happen:

      At the salt mines of Salzburg, they throw a leafless wintry bough into one of the abandoned workings. Two or three months later they haul it out covered with a shining deposit of crystals. The smallest twig, no bigger than a tom-tit’s claw, is studded with a galaxy of scintillating diamonds. The original branch is no longer recognizable.

      What I have called crystallization is a mental process which draws from everything that happens new proofs of the perfection of the loved one.

      You hear a traveller speaking of the cool orange groves beside the sea at Genoa in the summer heat: Oh, if you could only share that coolness with her!

      One of your friends goes hunting, and breaks his arm: wouldn’t it be wonderful to be looked after by the woman you love! To be with her all the time and to see her loving you…a broken arm would be proof of the angelic kindness of your mistress. In short, no sooner do you think of a virtue than you detect it in your beloved.

   Comment by Michael Hoke—January 28, 2006 @ 8:56 pm