Love

Love is the widest of the great ideas, and perhaps the most various. It covers the passion of man for woman and of woman for man, conjugal and parental affection, friendship, charity toward neighbour and enemy, the love of God, and the love of country. The Harvard Classics give it its due range. They hold Greek tragedy and Virgil, the Gospels and Paul, Augustine and à Kempis, Dante, Cervantes, Pascal and Milton, and then a great run of lyric, ballad, comedy and romantic poetry. What makes love a great idea in these books, rather than merely a frequent theme, is that the same word is used for things that seem to war with one another. The authors must ask whether these are kinds of one thing or rivals. They must ask whether passion is a madness or a ladder, and whether the love of creatures leads toward the love of God or away from it.

The most systematic answer comes from Dante. In the Purgatory Virgil explains that love is the soul’s inclining toward an image that pleases it, a spiritual motion that rests only in enjoying its object, and he adds that not all love is praiseworthy¹. Every creature has love. Natural love never errs, but the love of the free spirit errs by choosing a bad object, or by excess or defect². It may be aimed at a neighbour’s harm, given out of measure to lesser goods, or slack toward the true good³. The poem ends with Dante’s will turned by the Love that moves the sun and the other stars⁴. Marcus Aurelius had already said that the universe loves to make what is to be, and that he loves as it loves⁵. Shelley drew a lover’s plea from the same thought: all things mingle by divine law⁶. Pascal finds the disposition inborn. We are born to love, he says, and man could not live a moment without it⁷. Because man cannot dwell alone with himself, he seeks a likeness of himself, differentiated by sex⁸.

Against this cosmic view stand the analysts. Hobbes holds that love and desire are the same thing, differing only in whether the object is present or absent⁹. Rousseau separates physical love, a general desire, from moral love, a fictitious social sentiment that fixes on one object and that savages lack¹⁰. Society, not nature, gave love its fatal ardour¹¹. Burke grants that lust is merely generative, but says that love adds social qualities and attaches men to particular persons through beauty¹². He even explains the passion physiologically, as a relaxation of the body produced by beauty¹³. The moralists press the distinction harder. Penn writes that lust wastes by enjoyment while love grows, the one springing from union of souls and the other from sense¹⁴. Schiller adds that pleasure may be stolen, but love must be a gift¹⁵. Augustine’s confession shows what the distinction costs in a life: he loved loving, and he clouded the brightness of friendship with the fog of lust^16,17.

Self-love is where the order of loves is decided. For Pascal man was made with two loves, of God and of self, the second subordinate to the first¹⁸. In Adam self-love was just, but after the fall it became infinite and disordered¹⁹. It is rightly regulated only when we see ourselves as members of a whole²⁰. Pascal also suspects that we never love a person at all, only qualities that can perish²¹. Pope is serene where Pascal is anxious. He holds that self-love and social love are the same²², and that self-love widens outward to friend, parent, neighbour, country and every creature²³.

On the power of love the ancients speak of gods. Sophocles’ chorus hymns Love as the conqueror of gods and men, driving kin to strife²⁴. Euripides’ Nurse argues that Cypris is irresistible, since even Zeus yielded²⁵. Virgil’s Cupid, disguised as Ascanius, remakes Dido’s heart²⁶, and she roams the city like a stricken deer²⁷. Racine keeps the plea, with Theramenes calling Hippolytus’s love inevitable²⁸. Cervantes gives the most striking rebuttal to Marcela. Love comes by election, she says, not by destiny, and beauty attracts without obliging any return^29,30. Pascal turns the cause into an unknown something whose dreadful effects move whole countries, as Cleopatra’s nose did³¹. The effects run both ways. Plutarch’s Antony is robbed of his faculties as if drugged³², and Don Quixote earnestly resolves to go mad for his lady³³. Yet Pascal also holds that love turns the miser liberal and is identical with reason rather than blind³⁴. In Goethe, genuine love matures Hermann into a man in a moment³⁵. Emerson writes that love melts inequalities³⁶, and Shelley calls love the great secret of morals³⁷.

The poets fill out the lover’s fortunes. Prospero makes the courtship hard lest too light a winning make the prize light³⁸. Polonius treats Hamlet’s vows as springes to catch woodcocks³⁹. Donne’s twin compasses make parting an expansion rather than a breach^40,41. Pascal pities the lover as he swings between hope and fear⁴². Chrysostom pursues the wind and serves ingratitude until he dies of it⁴³. Andersen’s sea-maid chooses her own death rather than kill the prince who does not love her⁴⁴. Against Swinburne’s insistence that even deep love withers⁴⁵, Shakespeare sets love as an ever-fixed mark⁴⁶. Homer’s Odysseus prefers mortal Penelope to a goddess⁴⁷, and the ballads make rose and briar entwine over the graves of lovers⁴⁸.

The sharpest controversy is whether such passion is folly. Bacon is blunt: it is impossible to love and be wise, and love should be kept apart from serious business^49,50. Plutarch supplies the example. Antony follows Cleopatra’s fleeing ship and deserts the men fighting for him, proving that a lover’s soul lives in another’s body⁵¹. Dryden stages the same story as a defence. His Antony counts Cleopatra worth more worlds⁵² and rejects the world for a love that never satiates⁵³. Pascal fears the theatre itself, which sends audiences home persuaded of love’s innocence⁵⁴. Johnson praises Shakespeare for treating love as only one passion among many⁵⁵. Where love opposes wealth, opinion is nearly unanimous. France says love is not love when mixed with mercenary regards⁵⁶, Dekker’s king declares that love disregards blood⁵⁷, and Burns’s collier lass calls love for love the only bargain⁵⁸. Lessing alone insists that equality is the sure bond of love⁵⁹.

A third position lifts passion upward. In Milton, Raphael calls rational love a ladder to heavenly love⁶⁰. Plutarch’s Alcibiades returns Socrates’ love in awe of his virtue⁶¹, and Montaigne describes the Academy’s love as one that ends in friendship⁶². Dante’s old love for Beatrice revives at her presence⁶³. Renan traces to chivalry, not to antiquity, the idea that love is the supreme principle of morality⁶⁴. Shelley holds that the freedom of women made sexual love a religion⁶⁵. Ruskin wants the lover’s service to continue within marriage⁶⁶. Cervantes both honours and mocks the ideal: Quixote defends a Dulcinea whom he admits is largely feigned⁶⁷.

Illicit love tests every one of these views. Dante’s Francesca says that love quickly seizes gentle hearts, and she tells how reading of Lancelot led to the kiss^68,69. Yet Folco, more ardent once than Dido, now in Heaven feels only joy⁷⁰. Aphrodite makes Phaedra her instrument of vengeance⁷¹, and Racine’s Phaedra holds her inherited passion in horror⁷². Dido calls the cave a marriage to cover her shame⁷³ and turns from Aeneas among the Mournful Fields⁷⁴. Dryden praises Virgil for tracing the whole course of such passion, through jealousy, rage and despair⁷⁵. Dorothea names her seducer’s motive appetite rather than love⁷⁶. Brynhild’s thwarted love turns to hatred⁷⁷, and Samson calls Dalila’s pleaded love lust and rage⁷⁸.

Conjugal love finds its great defender in Milton. He praises wedded love as pure and commanded by God, against false austerity⁷⁹, and contrasts it with the loveless pleasure of harlots⁸⁰. His Adam chooses death with Eve out of the bond of flesh⁸¹. Homer had already given husband and wife their fill of love in the old bed⁸². Penn counsels that love both brings a couple together and keeps them so⁸³. Mill makes his dead wife’s memory a religion⁸⁴. Dante’s Nino is darker, saying that a widow’s love lasts only while sight and touch renew it⁸⁵. Wordsworth’s returned husband asks Laodamia for depth, not tumult⁸⁶. Kinship love too divides its observers. Rousseau traces a mother’s affection to habit⁸⁷, while Homer’s Anticleia dies of longing for her son⁸⁸ and Cordelia measures her love by bond and duty rather than words⁸⁹.

Friendship is closely related. Cicero calls the friend a second self⁹⁰. He holds that friendship springs from natural love rather than need⁹¹, and that friendship and love share one root⁹². Montaigne can give no reason for his friendship but “Because it was he, because it was myself”⁹³. He prefers its tempered heat to the fever of passion⁹⁴. Emerson calls love between the sexes the first symbol of friendship between virtuous men⁹⁵. Augustine, grieving, judges that his error lay in loving a mortal as if he would never die, and that friendship is true only when cemented in God^96,97.

Charity carries love beyond preference. Paul makes it greater than faith and hope, and without it all gifts are nothing⁹⁸. Luke joins love of God to love of neighbour and defines the neighbour as the one who shows mercy⁹⁹. He also commands love of enemies, since even sinners love those who love them¹⁰⁰. The ancients reach a similar conclusion by other roads. Marcus Aurelius thinks it peculiar to man to love wrongdoers as kin¹⁰¹. Confucius says simply that love is to love mankind¹⁰² and makes it the core virtue¹⁰³. Pascal sets charity in a supernatural order, so that its least motion outweighs all bodies and minds¹⁰⁴, and he finds charity the sole aim of Scripture¹⁰⁵. The motive is debated. Kant reads the command as practical love seated in the will, not as feeling¹⁰⁶. Browne wants charity to spring from God’s command rather than pity, which is partly self-relief¹⁰⁷. Luther finds it flowing freely from faith, without regard to gain¹⁰⁸. Emerson suspects distant philanthropy of being spite at home¹⁰⁹. Manzoni shows charity in action in Federigo, who spends all his means on the poor¹¹⁰, and who rebukes a timid priest with the words, You should have loved¹¹¹. For Woolman love of God brings tenderness toward all people¹¹², and Coleridge’s Mariner learns that he prays best who loves best¹¹³.

Love of God is described in the language of human love. Augustine loves God with a love unlike any love of bodily beauty, yet he names it with the same words¹¹⁴. À Kempis finds love of God tireless and restful only in God¹¹⁵. In Milton, divine love comes first: the Son is worthiest because he is good rather than merely great¹¹⁶. Herbert’s Love bids the unworthy soul sit and eat¹¹⁷. Whether that love can be disinterested is pressed by a Latin hymn that loves God not for heaven or out of fear of hell¹¹⁸, and by à Kempis, who serves God for nothing¹¹⁹. Sancho comically reaches the same doctrine through his master’s service of Dulcinea¹²⁰. Burke, by contrast, doubts that love is the first or most natural effect of the idea of Deity¹²¹. Pascal adds that knowing God is far from loving Him¹²², since the heart’s order is love, not demonstration¹²³.

The rivalry of divine and creaturely love takes several forms. Augustine bids men love bodies and souls in God¹²⁴. Corneille’s Polyeucte loves Pauline more than himself but less than God¹²⁵. Tartuffe parodies the reconciliation, arguing that love of eternal beauty leaves room for earthly beauty¹²⁶. Pascal sets charity against covetousness as opposed principles of the will¹²⁷. Dante gives the gentlest answer. Beatrice smiles when love for God eclipses love for her¹²⁸, and all love finally draws the soul to God in proportion to its goodness¹²⁹.

Love of country, finally, is shown as ordered affection. Johnson defines it as love of countrymen, graded by nearness¹³⁰. Burke calls love of the little platoon the first link toward love of mankind^131,132. Confucius makes love the root of courtesy¹³³. Pliny finds that affection secures obedience where fear breeds hatred¹³⁴, and Penn thinks princes foolish to prefer being feared¹³⁵. Lincoln appeals to the mystic chords of memory¹³⁶. Emerson notes that a state founded on love has never been tried¹³⁷, though he half dismisses the hope as castles in the air¹³⁸.

The questions remain open. These books never settle whether love is one motion with many objects, as Dante and Pope believed, or several loves that compete, as Pascal and à Kempis feared. They leave unresolved whether passion is Bacon’s folly or Shelley’s school of morals, and whether charity is a feeling, a command or an act of will.