A man's worst faults are usually his virtues carried to excess. What is true of man is also true of women. A woman's greatest virtue is her self-centeredness. When it is carried to an excess of vanity, she needs a man to treat her strongly with gentleness, and occasionally gently with bluntness.

A woman's problem is to be an intimate friend while not ceasing to be a total stranger, and a man's problem is to be a gentle man (gentleman) while retaining the blood-and-guts of his masculinity.

One reason he needs the capacity for both is that they are the specific qualities he will probably need to keep her excess vanity in line. A woman will overstep her bounds deliberately on occasion to see just what her limits are and what she can get away with. It had better not be too much.

The main reason, however, that a man had better radiate gentleness and strength is that if he doesn't, he probably won't get far enough into the relationship to use them.

Once again we are back to the law of aesthetics. He has to have at least two qualities in his personality in some kind of tension.

Obviously, a man may first attract a woman by possessing either a basic gentleness or strength, but if he is to retain her interest over time, he must reveal that he also possesses its counterpart.

A man can be very interesting by playing the tension of his brilliant intellect against the instability of his emotions. As fascinating at any given time that he may be, a crisis will come in the future that neither his intellect nor his passion without discipline is going to be able to resolve.

Most men possess either gentleness or strength, but not both. The moral man must reconcile them. Men are usually either strong and take what they want without sensitivity, or, being sensitive, they lack the blood-and-guts to get what they essentially want. A man must first decide which he basically is, gentle or strong, and then carefully cultivate experiences of the opposite kind.