...
She dropped her glove, to prove his love, then looked at him and smiled;
He bowed, and in a moment leaped among the lions wild:
The leap was quick, return was quick, he has regained his place,
Then threw the glove, but not with love, right in the lady's face.
"By Heaven," said Francis, "rightly done!" and he rose from where he sat;
"No love," quoth he, "but vanity, sets love a task like that."
-- James Leigh Hunt
The poem Lynx quoted is a perfect example of what the worldly call a "$**! test". It's a contrived examination of another person designed to expose their real motivations. The trouble is, it usually does more to expose one's own motivations. If a female in whom I was otherwise interested did something like that to me, I would happily wish her a nice life and move on.
"If you loved me, you would... " is often met adequately by the response, "If you loved me, you wouldn't ask that!"
I think it is certainly acceptable to test the asserted love of another by considering their actions, but to contrive a test is not acceptable. As others have said, if love is real, stating it should be mere confirmation of the actions that have already proven it.
There is an implicit flip side to the $**! test: having unspoken expectations. Holding your partner to some standard about which they are unaware is just as unloving as ignoring them when they speak. Don't be that guy (or girl!). I'm not sure there ever was such a society, but ours certainly doesn't have a single standard of etiquette, so expecting someone to "just know something" is not reasonable. Don't put up with abuse or criminal behaviour of course, but don't condemn a person for failing to know that you intensely dislike anything ecru. If you expect them to know something, tell them. If you want something, ask for it! Otherwise you have nobody to blame but yourself.
One more thought: take it whence it comes. Don't expect that "I love you" from the gf/bf of six months means the same thing as "I love you" from your spouse of twenty years.
She dropped her glove, to prove his love, then looked at him and smiled;
He bowed, and in a moment leaped among the lions wild:
The leap was quick, return was quick, he has regained his place,
Then threw the glove, but not with love, right in the lady's face.
"By Heaven," said Francis, "rightly done!" and he rose from where he sat;
"No love," quoth he, "but vanity, sets love a task like that."
-- James Leigh Hunt
The poem Lynx quoted is a perfect example of what the worldly call a "$**! test". It's a contrived examination of another person designed to expose their real motivations. The trouble is, it usually does more to expose one's own motivations. If a female in whom I was otherwise interested did something like that to me, I would happily wish her a nice life and move on.
"If you loved me, you would... " is often met adequately by the response, "If you loved me, you wouldn't ask that!"
I think it is certainly acceptable to test the asserted love of another by considering their actions, but to contrive a test is not acceptable. As others have said, if love is real, stating it should be mere confirmation of the actions that have already proven it.
There is an implicit flip side to the $**! test: having unspoken expectations. Holding your partner to some standard about which they are unaware is just as unloving as ignoring them when they speak. Don't be that guy (or girl!). I'm not sure there ever was such a society, but ours certainly doesn't have a single standard of etiquette, so expecting someone to "just know something" is not reasonable. Don't put up with abuse or criminal behaviour of course, but don't condemn a person for failing to know that you intensely dislike anything ecru. If you expect them to know something, tell them. If you want something, ask for it! Otherwise you have nobody to blame but yourself.
One more thought: take it whence it comes. Don't expect that "I love you" from the gf/bf of six months means the same thing as "I love you" from your spouse of twenty years.