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With Emmy herself, her innocence and my own scruples and
respect were a better safeguard than all moral laws. But as soon as I
detected in a woman, totally strange and indifferent to me, ugly even
and repulsive, this peculiar weakness, usually paired with good nature,
which indicated in an almost imperceptible manner that the parting wall
of modesty would fall at my first assault, I already felt myself lost
from the beginning in spite of all conventional restrictions.
I sometimes vainly endeavored to imagine how ugly a woman would have to
be to make me repel her advances with stony coolness. Every woman, the
least attractive even, could make me stumble, simply by humbling
herself. As by an excess of chivalry, I could not refuse a woman's
request nor even await it. It was as though I must prevent her casting
off her modesty at all costs by my own debasement; that is to say, as
long as she desired only my body and not my heart. My heart remained
out of shot range behind the walls of my true love for Emmy.


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