In the wonderful mixtures of our nature there is a feeling distinct from that exclusive passionate love of which some men and women (by no means all) are capable, which yet is not the same with friendship, nor with a merely benevolent regard, whether admiring or compassionate: a man, say--for it is a man who is here concerned--hardly represents to himself this shade of feeling toward a woman more nearly than in words, "I should have loved her, if----": the "if" covering some prior growth in the inclinations, or else some circumstances which have made an inward prohibitory law as a stay against the emotions ready to quiver out of balance. 
His feeling for her was not passionate love, yet was not the same as friendship, or a merely benevolent regard. A man may express this feeling in the words, "I should have loved her, if": the "if" covering some circumstance set against the emotions ready to quiver out of balance.
