He remained for a moment utterly confused,
like people overcome with passion and deprived of all presence of mind
by a sudden shock. If Anna has since then had any lovers [which is a
pure hypothesis] Adolph certainly is not one of them.
This occurrence may help you to understand that correspondence is a
double-edged weapon which is of as much advantage for the defence of
the husband as for the inconsistency of the wife. You should therefore
encourage correspondence for the same reason that the prefect of
police takes special care that the street lamps of Paris are kept
lighted.
3. OF SPIES.
To come so low as to beg servants to reveal secrets to you, and to
fall lower still by paying for a revelation, is not a crime; it is
perhaps not even a dastardly act, but it is certainly a piece of
folly; for nothing will ever guarantee to you the honesty of a servant
who betrays her mistress, and you can never feel certain whether she
is operating in your interest or in that of your wife. This point
therefore may be looked upon as beyond controversy.
Nature, that good and tender parent, has set round about the mother of
a family the most reliable and the most sagacious of spies, the most
truthful and at the same time the most discreet in the world.
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