necessary variety, to prevent the weariness of seeing it always in the
same state. In a word, woe to the woman of too monotonous a
temperament; her monotony satiates and disgusts. She is always the
same statue, with her a man is always right. She is so good, so
gentle, that she takes away from people the privilege of quarreling
with her, and this is often such a great pleasure! Put in her place a
vivacious woman, capricious, decided, to a certain limit, however, and
things assume a different aspect. The lover will find in the same
person the pleasure of variety. Temper is the salt, the quality which
prevents it from becoming stale. Restlessness, jealousy, quarrels,
making friends again, spitefulness, all are the food of love.
Enchanting variety! which fills, which occupies a sensitive heart much
more deliciously than the regularity of behavior, and the tiresome
monotony which is called "good disposition."

I know how you men must be governed. A caprice puts you in an
uncertainty, which you have as much trouble and grief in dispelling as
though it were a victory obtained over a new object. Roughness makes
you hold your breath. You do not stop disputing, but neither do you
cease to conquer and to be conquered. In vain does reason sigh. You
can not comprehend how such an imp manages to subjugate you so
tyrannically. Everything tells you that the idol of your heart is a
collection of caprices and follies, but she is a spoiled child, whom
you can not help but love. The efforts which reflection causes you to
make to loosen them, serve only to forge still tighter your chains;
for love is never so strong as when you believe it ready to break away
in the heat of a quarrel. It loves, it storms; with it, everything is
convulsive. Would you reduce it to rule? It languishes, it expires. In
a word, this is what I wanted to say; do not take for a mistress a
woman who has only reliable qualities; but one who is sometimes