I have always loved truth so passionately that I have often resorted to lying as a way of introducing it into the minds which were ignorant of its charms.
Should I perchance still feel after my death, I would no longer have any doubt, but I would most certainly give the lie to anyone asserting before me that I was dead.
As to the deceit perpetrated upon women, let it pass, for, when love is in the way, men and women as a general rule dupe each other.
Real love is the love that sometimes arises after sensual pleasure: if it does, it is immortal; the other kind inevitably goes stale, for it lies in mere fantasy.
The same principle that forbids me to lie does not allow me to tell the truth.