quieter love

"Being in love is a good thing, but not the best thing... it is a noble feeling, but it still a feeling. Now, no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all... in fact, the state of being in love usually does not last... but of course ceasing to be 'in love' need not mean ceasing to love.

Love is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by the grace which both partners ask and receive from God... they can retain this love even when each would easily, if they allowed themselves, be 'in love' with someone else.

being in love first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables to keep their promise. it is on this love that the entire engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it."

- Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis.