Anton raised her hand to challenge me, but she let it drop again. I should have urged her to speak.

      "I can prove what I said," I said cautiously. "I can prove for example that I love you. I can prove the substance if it. Whatever is true must have substance or else it isn't true."

      "Ah, I see! You want to entice me," Anton interrupted me and grinned.

      "Why would I want to entice you?" I asked. "You are already lodged in my heart. What more would I want? In fact you were lodged there before we even met. And that's the truth. So what more would I gain than what I already have? And if that is true for as a natural reflection of our humanity, it is evidently also true for you. So why would I need to entice you if you are already in love with me," I added, "as indeed most human beings are with one-another in their heart of hearts?"

      "You are taking too much for granted, Peter," Anton interrupted me.

      "Am I, Anton? Be honest with yourself. Threads of love that are out-flowing like light from a sun are always universal. Our humanity is a sun. It reflects the Spirit of the universe that is filled with countless stars each one of which is a son in its own right. Love is necessarily universal, because it reflects a universal principle. To deny love in any form is a form of self-denial, because to be human being is to love. If there wasn't a bright spark of that love alive in you would have come her, or you would have walked out by now. The problem is that most people want to deny their love that is true and cling to something less, something artificial. Our head tells us that the denial is good; the denial is save; it's comfortable; even if the denial is built on sand."

      Anton waved her finger at me. "You are exceedingly daring, Peter. I give you that."

      I had to laugh suddenly. "Are you an opera fan, Anton?" I asked. "German opera?"

      She shook her head.

      "If you were, you might remember Mozart's opera, The Marriage of Figaro. That's what daring is. Compared to that I'm just a boy. I think Mozart went way out on the limb with this one, with a daring that's hard to beat.  Just picture this: It is the day of Figaro's marriage to Susanna. They are both servants in a noble house. Alas, the Count, their employer, is also in love with Susanna. As the day of Susanna's wedding unfolds the intrigue over Susanna becomes more and more complex. In the end Susanna agrees to a rendezvous with the Count. But that was urged by the Countess who knows about it, who turns it into a plot. So the countess come to the rendezvous in the garden disguised as Susanna. The rendezvous takes place in the dark of the night. There, in the secret romantic setting in the moonlight the Count pours out his heart to her, assuming her to be Susanna. He speaks with a display of passion and words of love such as his wife hadn't heard from him for years. While all of this outpouring of love happens, the conspiracy becomes suddenly revealed. With that a New World begins to unfold. Whatever was done cannot be undone. What was said from the heart cannot be unsaid. Nevertheless the gracious Countess pardons the Count and the scene ends joyously as a triumph of love with a sublime music that only Mozart could have written. Here the opera closes. The curtain falls. But what happens the next day? Susanna remains in the court. What is in the heart remains in the heart and cannot be easily banished. However, the smallness in society's thinking can be banished. Wasn't that the real theme of the opera? And so, a profound paradox was left in place for the audience to sort out. The audience is forced to evaluate the validity of the accepted boundaries of love based on the property issues that overshadow so much. The Count and the Countess were the property of one another, and Susanna the property of Figaro, but the heart said we are all human beings, not property. Here love is rooted on a higher level, above the morals of property issues. Somebody dared to speak the truth and Mozart set it to music. Shouldn't the truth be spoken always and in every circumstance?"

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Stories about  Love from novels by Rolf A. F. Witzsche