Jude the Obsure

"I am so glad you see that much, at any rate. I never deliberately

meant to do as I did. I slipped into my false position through

jealousy and agitation!"

"But surely through love--you loved me?"

"Yes. But I wanted to let it stop there, and go on always as mere

lovers; until--"

"But people in love couldn't live for ever like that!"

"Women could: men can't, because they--won't. An average woman is

in this superior to an average man--that she never instigates, only

responds. We ought to have lived in mental communion, and no more."

"I was the unhappy cause of the change, as I have said

before! ... Well, as you will! ... But human nature can't help

being itself."

"Oh yes--that's just what it has to learn--self-mastery."

"I repeat--if either were to blame it was not you but I."

"No--it was I. Your wickedness was only the natural man's desire

to possess the woman. Mine was not the reciprocal wish till envy

stimulated me to oust Arabella. I had thought I ought in charity to

let you approach me--that it was damnably selfish to torture you as

I did my other friend. But I shouldn't have given way if you hadn't

broken me down by making me fear you would go back to her... But

don't let us say any more about it! Jude, will you leave me to

myself now?"

"Yes... But Sue--my wife, as you are!" he burst out; "my old

reproach to you was, after all, a true one. You have never loved me

as I love you--never--never! Yours is not a passionate heart--your

heart does not burn in a flame! You are, upon the whole, a sort of

fay, or sprite--not a woman!"

"At first I did not love you, Jude; that I own. When I first knew

you I merely wanted you to love me. I did not exactly flirt with

you; but that inborn craving which undermines some women's morals

almost more than unbridled passion--the craving to attract and

captivate, regardless of the injury it may do the man--was in me; and

when I found I had caught you, I was frightened. And then--I don't

know how it was--I couldn't bear to let you go--possibly to Arabella

again--and so I got to love you, Jude. But you see, however fondly

it ended, it began in the selfish and cruel wish to make your heart

ache for me without letting mine ache for you."

"And now you add to your cruelty by leaving me!"