A Severe Mercy

This, ladies and gentlemen, is it:

"The failure of love might seem to be caused by hate or boredom or unfaithfulness with a lover; but those were results. First came the creeping separateness: the failure behind the failure... We would have our own standards. And, above all, we would be us-centered, not self-centered. Against creeping separateness we would oppose the great principle of sharing. We saw self as the ultimate danger to love, which it is; we didn't see it as the ultimate evil of hell, which it also is."
(Quote from "A Severe Mercy" by Sheldon Vanauken)