Charteris monologue (Act 1) — The Philanderer

(placably) So it did, my dear. But that is not the point. As a woman of advanced views, you were determined to be free. You regarded marriage as a degrading bargain, by which a woman sold herself to a man for the social status of a wife and the right to be supported and pensioned in old age out of his income. That's the advanced view--our view. Besides, if you had married me, I might have turned out a drunkard, a criminal, an imbecile, a horror to you; and you couldn't have released yourself. Too big a risk, you see. That's the rational view--our view. Accordingly, you reserved the right to leave me at any time if you found our companionship incompatible with--what was the expression you used?--with your full development as a human being: I think that was how you put the Ibsenist view--our view. So I had to be content with a charming philander, which taught me a great deal, and brought me some hours of exquisite happiness.