Terrified and pale the wretched bride listened to the voice which seemed that of her destiny, a grave voice and free from any interest which was not true, a voice which seemed cruel, but whose cruelty contained a lofty common-sense.
“For that matter don’t complain. You will know later on, when you are calm and wise, how rarely a man marries with passion in his heart and feelings for his bride. Men marry nearly always to be quiet, for security from all amorous tempests. Hasn’t Marco done this? I add, to reassure you, that in the rare cases in which marriage has taken place in obedience to passion it has always ended in unhappiness.”
“Thus God wills it,” the Duchess pronounced with a voice more profound and touching. “Christian marriage, which faith and the Church consecrate for life and death, ought not, and can not, serve for the satisfaction of the voracious flame of our senses. And if it be so it is a state of sin. We don’t marry, Vittoria, for the intoxication of a short time. It isn’t for this that the Lord calls us and chooses us in marriage blessed by Himself. If we reduce this sacrament to a profane pleasure, we violate a divine law.”
“It is horrible, it is horrible,” cried Vittoria, as if she felt herself suffocated.
“It isn’t so horrible,” cried the Duchess. “Be more Christian than woman in matrimony and more woman than sweetheart. Don’t commit the ugly sin and grave mistake of being your husband’s mistress! Vittoria, Vittoria, don’t degrade yourself in wishing to be like _the other_! After a little you would be betrayed and despised. Thousands of women have tried to be their husband’s mistresses, falling into a sentimental trap, and other thousands will try it after you, and all, my daughter, all have had, and will have, the same fate--they will be betrayed and despised.”
“But has the world always been so? Will it always be so? But you, you, my aunt,” Vittoria ventured to cry, “weren’t you ardently loved by your husband? You who shone with every virtue, rich, of a great family. Didn’t you love your husband, the Duke of Altomonte, ardently? That is what is known; tell me if it is true.”
The Duchess of Altomonte moved her hand vaguely and slowly, and for the first time a slight smile appeared on her lips.