|
Approximately 2500 years ago a Greek writer named Euripides, while speaking of love in his play "Hyppolytus", penned the words: |
|
Upon the yielding spirit she comes gently, but to a proud and fanatic heart she is a torturer. |
|
As Euripides could see, there were people "tortured by love" even a few thousand years ago. Fight as they will, the "proud and fanatic hearts" which these people possess, allow them to be in love to the point of ecstasy, or not in love at all. There are no alternatives. In the same play, Euripides also said: |
|
The tide of love, at its full surge, is not withstandable. |
|
If this is true of the average human being, what must it be for those who
possess a "proud and fanatic heart"? It will be ecstasy or it will be pain. Again, there are no alternatives. In another of his plays, "The Trojan Women", Euripides spoke again of love and this time he said: |
|
A man in love once, is never out of love again. |
|
I suspect that this applies to women also. If one were to equate a "yearning for love", or a "preoccupation with love", or a "remembering of the feel of love", with actually being in love.......then I agree. A man in love once, is never out of love again. But it may also be conceivable that a person really in love with someone, will be in love with that same person until an equally strong love for someone else displaces it. With that as an assumption, Euripides statement again holds true. But one thing I know.......A man in love once, is never the same. |