60 The Triunity of Man [CH. 



but also, Tout comprendre c'est aimer. The first is true 

 for creative timeless being, the second for being that is 

 in time. You can not love a person till you know him ; 

 and to know him means first to know his attributes 

 his thoughts, his interests, his activities, his character. 

 When you know his attributes and approve them 1 you 

 love him ; that is, you seek to share his life ; to know him ; 

 and so to know his activities from the inside. Further, 

 to know and love you must approve. There must be 

 a similitude and inner sympathy between your own 

 nature and his. Therefore, if you love a person you can 

 gain some understanding of his nature by examining 

 your own. The commonplace that opposite natures 

 attract one another is blatantly untrue, though com- 

 plementary natures no doubt do. A religious man is not 

 intensely attracted by a profane man whose inmost 

 thoughts are blasphemies. A pure man is not attracted 

 by a moral leper. An able man is not attracted by 

 another simply because that other is stupid, and has the 

 most profound contempt for capacity and thought. A 

 wise man is not attracted by a fool. On the other hand 

 a deep thinker who is conscious of lack of humour may 

 be attracted by one who adds humour to interest in 

 thought. A man who is sombre in his religion may be 

 attracted by a beautiful soul which is also blessed with 

 joie de vivre. The sense of lack does seek fulfilment in 

 union with another. This fact is very suggestive, but 

 it has nothing to do with the statement that like repels 

 like and attracts unlike. Two men who suffer from 

 identical defects will very likely repel one another; but 

 this is because of the absence of like qualities in each, 

 not their presence. The lack which each feels is not 



1 Approval is necessary, for love is interpenetration, all but 

 identification without the loss of self-identity. Disapproval is on 

 a pedestal, and you cannot love from a pedestal. True approval 

 has nothing in it of de-kaut-en-bas, for the approval is fellowship. 



