I said that there was hardly any doubt that I had deceived myself; that my passion was no more than the last burning-up of the desires of a man who, though long celibate, was still, after all, a male creature; that I had idealized a perfectly ordinary young woman by way of making my love reasonable—for a love like that, if it is not an illusion, needs a wonderful object—that I had taken Bronwen at her face-value and I was a poor judge of faces.
