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126 irony of our nature that we cannot return to any woman, except by a lie of the body and the spirit, (often being unable to compass or to endure that wretched subterfuge) a warmer glow than affection's calmest pulsations. Several times, before my consulting Dr. D... I had had the opportunity of marrying 'happily and wisely' - if marriage with any woman could have meant only a friendship. Naught physical, no responsibility of sex toward the wife to whom one gives oneself. But "the will to possess, the desire to surrender", the negation of what is ourself which comes with the arms of some one other human creature about us—ours about him—long before, had I understood that the like of this joy was not possible for me with wife of [sic] mistress. It had seemed to me hopeless of [sic] attempt. If marriage exact [sic] that effort.. good God! then it means a growing wretchedness, riddle and mystery for two human beings, not for one. Stay! it means worse still, should they not be childless......"

"But now I had my prescription, and I was to be cured. In ten days, Imre, I was betroth-