On Love

by Alain de Botton

It is surprising how often rejection in love is framed in moral language, the language of right and wrong, good and evil, as though to reject or not reject, to love or not to love, was something that naturally belonged to a branch of ethics. It is surprising how often the one who rejects is labeled evil, and the one who is rejected comes to embody the good. There was something of this moral attitude in both Chloe and my behavior. Framing her rejection, she had equated her inability to love with evil, and my love for her as evidence of goodness—hence the conclusion, made on the basis of nothing more than that I still desired her, that I was “too good” for her. Assuming that she largely meant what she said and was not simply being polite, she had made the ethical point that she was not good enough for me, by virtue of nothing more than having ceased to love me—something she had deemed made her a less worthy person than I, a man who, in all the goodness of his heart, still felt able to love her. 9. But however unfortunate rejection may be, can we really equate loving with selflessness, and rejection with cruelty; can we really equate love with goodness and indifference with evil? Was my love for Chloe moral, and her rejection of me immoral? The guilt owed to Chloe for rejecting me depended primarily on the extent to which love could be seen as something that I had given selflessly—for if selfish motives entered into my gift, then Chloe was surely justified in equally selfishl...