The Indiscreet Jewels by Denis Diderot

The African author, who had promised to bring Selim's character into some part of his book, has thought fit to place it here: and I have too much esteem for the works of antiquity, to assert that it would come in better somewhere else. "There are," says he, "some men, whose merit gives them access everywhere, who by their graceful person, and free easy wit, are in their youth the darlings of many women; and whose gray hairs are respected, because having known how to reconcile their duties with their pleasures, they have rendered their middle stage of life illustrious, by services done for the state: in a word, men, who at all times are the delight of society. Such was Selim. Though he had reached sixty years, and that he had entered the list of pleasure early; a strong constitution and some management had preserved him from the infirmities of age. A noble air, an easy carriage, insinuating language, a great knowledge of the world, founded on long experience, the habit of dealing with the sex, made him to be regarded at court, as a man whom everybody would choose to resemble, but who would be unsuccessfully copied, for want of being endowed by nature with the talents and genius which had distinguished him.

"Now I desire to know," continues the African author, "if this man had reason to make himself uneasy on the score of a mistress, and to spend the night like a mad man? For the fact is, that a thousand reflections rolled in his head; and the more he loved Fulvia, the more he feared to find her unfaithful. ‘Into what labyrinth have I thrust my self? ' said he to himself. ‘And to what purpose? What advantage will accrue to me, in case the favorite should win a castle; and what will be my fate, if she loses it? But why should she lose it? Am I not certain of Fulvia's love? Ah! I am in the sole and entire possession of her; and if her Toy speak, it will be of me alone.