Perhaps her sorrow is true, but she deceives you as to the
motives she gives for it. Break these chains without scruple. In
priding yourself on your constancy and delicacy for such an object,
you appear to me to be as ridiculous as you were when you lacked the
same qualities on another occasion.
Do you remember, Marquis, what Monsieur de Coulanges said to us one
day? "Constancy is the virtue of people of limited merit. Have they
profited by the caprice of an amiable woman to establish themselves in
her heart? the sentiment of medicrioty fixes them there, it
intimidates them, they dare not make an effort to please others. Too
happy at having surprised her heart, they are afraid of abandoning a
good which they may not find elsewhere, and, as an instant's attention
to their little worth might undeceive this woman, what do they then
do? They elevate constancy up among the virtues; they transform love
into a superstition; they know how to interest reason in the
preservation of a heart which they owe only to caprice, occasion, or
surprise.
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