Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Chapters VI-IX



CHAPTER VI. THE EFFECT WHICH AN EARLY ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS HAS UPON THE 
CHARACTER.

EDUCATED in the enervating style recommended by the writers on whom I have 
been animadverting; and not having a chance, from their subordinate state 
in society, to recover their lost ground, is it surprising that women 
every where appear a defect in nature? Is it surprising, when we consider 
what a determinate effect an early association of ideas has on the 
character, that they neglect their understandings, and turn all their 
attention to their persons?

The great advantages which naturally result from storing the mind with 
knowledge, are obvious from the following considerations. The association 
of our ideas is either habitual or instantaneous; and the latter mode 
seems rather to depend on the original temperature of the mind than on the 
will. When the ideas, and matters of fact, are once taken in, they lie by 
for use, till some fortuitous circumstance makes the information dart into 
the mind with illustrative force, that has been received at very different 
periods of our lives. Like the lightning's flash are many recollections; 
one idea assimilating and explaining another, with astonishing rapidity. I 
do not now allude to that quick perception of truth, which is so intuitive 
that it baffles research, and makes us at a loss to determine whether it 
is reminiscence or ratiocination, lost sight of in its celerity, that 
opens the dark cloud. Over those instantaneous associations we have little 
power; for when the mind is once enlarged by excursive flights, or 
profound reflection, the raw materials will, in some degree, arrange 
themselves. The understanding, it is true, may keep us from going out of 
drawing when we group our thoughts, or transcribe from the imagination the 
warm sketches of fancy; but the animal spirits, the individual character, 
give the colouring. Over this subtile electric fluid,(1) how little power 
do we possess, and over it how little power can reason obtain! These fine 
intractable spirits appear to be the essence of genius, and beaming in its 
eagle eye, produce in the most eminent degree the happy energy of 
associating thoughts that surprise, delight, and instruct. These are the 
glowing minds that concentrate pictures for their fellow-creatures; 
forcing them to view with interest the objects reflected from the 
impassioned imagination, which they passed over in nature.

I must be allowed to explain myself. The generality of people cannot see 
or feel poetically, they want fancy, and therefore fly from solitude in 
search of sensible objects; but when an author lends them his eyes they 
can see as he saw, and be amused by images they could not select, though 
lying before them. 

Education thus only supplies the man of genius with knowledge to give 
variety and contrast to his associations; but there is an habitual 
association of ideas, that grows 'with our growth,' which has a great 
effect on the moral character of mankind; and by which a turn is given to 
the mind that commonly remains throughout life. So ductile is the 
understanding, and yet so stubborn, that the associations which depend on 
adventitious circumstances, during the period that the body takes to 
arrive at maturity, can seldom be disentangled by reason. One idea calls 
up another, its old associate, and memory, faithful to the first 
impressions, particularly when the intellectual powers are not employed to 
cool our sensations, retraces them with mechanical exactness.

This habitual slavery, to first impressions, has a more baneful effect on 
the female than the male character, because business and other dry 
employments of the understanding, tend to deaden the feelings and break 
associations that do violence to reason. But females, who are made women 
of when they are mere children, and brought back to childhood when they 
ought to leave the go-cart for ever, have not sufficient strength of mind 
to efface the superinductions of art that have smothered nature.

Every thing that they see or hear serves to fix impressions, call forth 
emotions, and associate ideas, that give a sexual character to the mind. 
False notions of beauty and delicacy stop the growth of their limbs and 
produce a sickly soreness, rather than delicacy of organs; and thus 
weakened by being employed in unfolding instead of examining the first 
associations, forced on them by every surrounding object, how can they 
attain the vigour necessary to enable them to throw off their factitious 
character? -- where find strength to recur to reason and rise superiour to 
a system of oppression, that blasts the fair promises of spring? This 
cruel association of ideas, which every thing conspires to twist into all 
their habits of thinking, or, to speak with more precision, of feeling, 
receives new force when they begin to act a little for themselves; for 
they then perceive that it is only through their address to excite 
emotions in men, that pleasure and power are to be obtained. Besides, the 
books professedly written for their instruction, which make the first 
impression on their minds, all inculcate the same opinions. Educated then 
in worse than Egyptian bondage, it is unreasonable, as well as cruel, to 
upbraid them with faults that can scarcely be avoided, unless a degree of 
native vigour be supposed, that falls to the lot of very few amongst 
mankind.

For instance, the severest sarcasms have been levelled against the sex, 
and they have been ridiculed for repeating 'a set of phrases learnt by 
rote,' when nothing could be more natural, considering the education they 
receive, and that their 'highest praise is to obey, unargued' -- the will 
of man. If they are not allowed to have reason sufficient to govern their 
own conduct -- why, all they learn -- must be learned by rote! And when 
all their ingenuity is called forth to adjust their dress, 'a passion for 
a scarlet coat,' is so natural, that it never surprised me; and, allowing 
Pope's summary of their character to be just, 'that every woman is at 
heart a rake,' why should they be bitterly censured for seeking a 
congenial mind, and preferring a rake to a man of sense?

Rakes know how to work on their sensibility, whilst the modest merit of 
reasonable men has, of course, less effect on their feelings, and they 
cannot reach the heart by the way of the understanding, because they have 
few sentiments in common.

It seems a little absurd to expect women to be more reasonable than men in 
their likings, and still to deny them the uncontrouled use of reason. When 
do men fall-in-love with sense? When do they, with their superiour powers 
and advantages, turn from the person to the mind? And how can they then 
expect women, who are only taught to observe behaviour, and acquire 
manners rather than morals, to despise what they have been all their lives 
labouring to attain? Where are they suddenly to find judgment enough to 
weigh patiently the sense of an awkward virtuous man, when his manners, of 
which they are made critical judges, are rebuffing, and his conversation 
cold and dull, because it does not consist of pretty repartees, or well 
turned compliments? In order to admire or esteem any thing for a 
continuance, we must, at least, have our curiosity excited by knowing, in 
some degree, what we admire; for we are unable to estimate the value of 
qualities and virtues above our comprehension. Such a respect, when it is 
felt, may be very sublime; and the confused consciousness of humility may 
render the dependent creature an interesting object, in some points of 
view; but human love must have grosser ingredients; and the person very 
naturally will come in for its share -- and, an ample share it mostly has!

Love is, in a great degree, an arbitrary passion, and will reign, like 
some other stalking mischiefs, by its own authority, without deigning to 
reason; and it may also be easily distinguished from esteem, the 
foundation of friendship, because it is often excited by evanescent 
beauties and graces, though to give an energy to the sentiment, something 
more solid must deepen their impression and set the imagination to work, 
to make the most fair -- the first good. 

Common passions are excited by common qualities. -- Men look for beauty 
and the simper of good-humoured docility: women are captivated by easy 
manners; a gentleman-like man seldom fails to please them, and their 
thirsty ears eagerly drink the insinuating nothings of politeness, whilst 
they turn from the unintelligible sounds of the charmer -- reason, charm 
he never so wisely. With respect to superficial accomplishments, the rake 
certainly has the advantage; and of these females can form an opinion, for 
it is their own ground. Rendered gay and giddy by the whole tenor of their 
lives, the very aspect of wisdom, or the severe graces of virtue, must 
have a lugubrious appearance to them; and produce a kind of restraint from 
which they and love, sportive child, naturally revolt. Without taste, 
excepting of the lighter kind, for taste is the offspring of judgment, how 
can they discover that true beauty and grace must arise from the play of 
the mind? and how can they be expected to relish in a lover what they do 
not, or very imperfectly, possess themselves? The sympathy that unites 
hearts, and invites to confidence, in them is so very faint, that it 
cannot take fire, and thus mount to passion. No, I repeat it, the love 
cherished by such minds, must have grosser fuel.

The inference is obvious; till women are led to exercise their 
understandings, they should not be satirized for their attachment to 
rakes; nor even for being rakes at heart, when it appears to be the 
inevitable consequence of their education. They who live to please -- must 
find their enjoyments, their happiness, in pleasure! It is a trite, yet 
true remark, that we never do any thing well, unless we love it for its 
own sake.

Supposing, however, for a moment, that women were, in some future 
revolution of time, to become, what I sincerely wish them to be, even love 
would acquire more serious dignity, and be purified in its own fires; and 
virtue giving true delicacy to their affections, they would turn with 
disgust from a rake. Reasoning then, as well as feeling, the only province 
of woman, at present, they might easily guard against exteriour graces, 
and quickly learn to despise the sensibility that had been excited and 
hackneyed in the ways of women, whose trade was vice; and allurements, 
wanton airs. They would recollect that the flame, one must use 
appropriated expressions, which they wished to light up, had been 
exhausted by lust, and that the sated appetite losing all relish for pure 
and simple pleasures, could only be roused by licentious arts or variety. 
What satisfaction could a woman of delicacy promise herself in a union 
with such a man, when the very artlessness of her affection might appear 
insipid? Thus does Dryden describe the situation,

'Where love is duty, on the female side, 
'On theirs mere sensual gust, and sought with surly pride.'

But one grand truth women have yet to learn, though much it imports them 
to act accordingly. In the choice of a husband, they should not be led 
astray by the qualities of a lover -- for a lover the husband, even 
supposing him to be wise and virtuous, cannot long remain.

Were women more rationally educated, could they take a more comprehensive 
view of things, they would be contented to love but once in their lives; 
and after marriage calmly let passion subside into friendship -- into that 
tender intimacy, which is the best refuge from care; yet is built on such 
pure, still affections, that idle jealousies would not be allowed to 
disturb the discharge of the sober duties of life, nor to engross the 
thoughts that ought to be otherwise employed. This is a state in which 
many men live; but few, very few women. And the difference may easily be 
accounted for, without recurring to a sexual character. Men, for whom we 
are told women were made, have too much occupied the thoughts of women; 
and this association has so entangled love with all their motives of 
action; and, to harp a little on an old string, having been solely 
employed either to prepare themselves to excite love, or actually putting 
their lessons in practice, they cannot live without love. But, when a 
sense of duty, or fear of shame, obliges them to restrain this pampered 
desire of pleasing beyond certain lengths, too far for delicacy, it is 
true, though far from criminality, they obstinately determine to love, I 
speak of the passion, their husbands to the end of the chapter -- and then 
acting the part which they foolishly exacted from their lovers, they 
become abject wooers, and fond slaves.

Men of wit and fancy are often rakes; and fancy is the food of love. Such 
men will inspire passion. Half the sex, in its present infantile state, 
would pine for a Lovelace; a man so witty, so graceful, and so valiant: 
and can they deserve blame for acting according to principles so 
constantly inculcated? They want a lover, and protector; and, behold him 
kneeling before them -- bravery prostrate to beauty! The virtues of a 
husband are thus thrown by love into the back ground, and gay hopes, or 
lively emotions, banish reflection till the day of reckoning comes; and 
come it surely will, to turn the sprightly lover into a surly suspicious 
tyrant, who contemptuously insults the very weakness he fostered. Or, 
supposing the rake reformed, he cannot quickly get rid of old habits. When 
a man of abilities is first carried away by his passions, it is necessary 
that sentiment and taste varnish the enormities of vice, and give a zest 
to brutal indulgences; but when the gloss of novelty is worn off, and 
pleasure palls upon the sense, lasciviousness becomes barefaced, and 
enjoyment only the desperate effort of weakness flying from reflection as 
from a legion of devils. Oh! virtue thou art not an empty name! All that 
life can give -- thou givest!

If much comfort cannot be expected from the friendship of a reformed rake 
of superiour abilities, what is the consequence when he lacketh sense, as 
well as principles? Verily misery, in its most hideous shape. When the 
habits of weak people are consolidated by time, a reformation is barely 
possible; and actually makes the beings miserable who have not sufficient 
mind to be amused by innocent pleasure; like the tradesman who retires 
from the hurry of business, nature presents to them only a universal 
blank; and the restless thoughts prey on the damped spirits.(2) Their 
reformation, as well as his retirement, actually makes them wretched 
because it deprives them of all employment, by quenching the hopes and 
fears that set in motion their sluggish minds.

If such is the force of habit; if such is the bondage of folly, how 
carefully ought we to guard the mind from storing up vicious associations; 
and equally careful should we be to cultivate the understanding, to save 
the poor wight from the weak dependent state of even harmless ignorance. 
For it is the right use of reason alone which makes us independent of 
every thing -- excepting the unclouded Reason -- 'whose service is perfect 
freedom.'

(1. I have sometimes, when inclined to laugh at materialists, asked 
whether, as the most powerful effects in nature, are apparently produced 
by fluids, the magnetic, &c. the passions might not be fine volatile 
fluids that embraced humanity, keeping the more refractory elementary 
parts together -- or whether they were simply a liquid fire that pervaded 
the more sluggish materials, giving them life and heat?)

(2. I have frequently seen this exemplified in women, whose beauty could 
no longer be repaired. They have retired from the noisy scenes of 
dissipation; but, unless they became methodists, the solitude of the 
select society of their family connexions or acquaintance, has presented 
only a fearful void; consequently, nervous complaints, and all the 
vapourish train of idleness, rendered them quite as useless, and far more 
unhappy, than when they joined the giddy throng.)



CHAPTER VII. MODESTY. -- COMPREHENSIVELY CONSIDERED, AND NOT AS A SEXUAL 
VIRTUE.

MODESTY! Sacred offspring of sensibility and reason! -- true delicacy of 
mind! -- may I unblamed presume to investigate thy nature, and trace to 
its covert the mild charm, that mellowing each harsh feature of a 
character, renders what would otherwise only inspire cold admiration -- 
lovely! -- Thou that smoothest the wrinkles of wisdom, and softenest the 
tone of the sublimest virtues till they all melt into humanity; -- thou 
that spreadest the ethereal cloud that surrounding love heightens every 
beauty, it half shades, breathing those coy sweets that steal into the 
heart, and charm the senses -- modulate for me the language of persuasive 
reason, till I rouse my sex from the flowery bed, on which they supinely 
sleep life away!

In speaking of the association of our ideas, I have noticed two distinct 
modes; and in defining modesty, it appears to me equally proper to 
discriminate that purity of mind, which is the effect of chastity, from a 
simplicity of character that leads us to form a just opinion of ourselves, 
equally distant from vanity or presumption, though by no means 
incompatible with a lofty consciousness of our own dignity. Modesty, in 
the latter signification of the term, is, that soberness of mind which 
teaches a man not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think, 
and should be distinguished from humility, because humility is a kind of 
self-abasement.

A modest man often conceives a great plan, and tenaciously adheres to it, 
conscious of his own strength, till success gives it a sanction that 
determines its character. Milton was not arrogant when he suffered a 
suggestion of judgment to escape him that proved a prophecy; nor was 
General Washington when he accepted of the command of the American forces. 
The latter has always been characterized as a modest man; but had he been 
merely humble, he would probably have shrunk back irresolute, afraid of 
trusting to himself the direction of an enterprise, on which so much 
depended.

A modest man is steady, an humble man timid, and a vain one 
presumptuous: -- this is the judgment, which the observation of many 
characters, has led me to form. Jesus Christ was modest, Moses was humble, 
and Peter vain.

Thus, discriminating modesty from humility in one case, I do not mean to 
confound it with bashfulness in the other. Bashfulness, in fact, is so 
distinct from modesty, that the most bashful lass, or raw country lout, 
often becomes the most impudent; for their bashfulness being merely the 
instinctive timidity of ignorance, custom soon changes it into 
assurance.(1)

The shameless behaviour of the prostitutes, who infest the streets of 
London, raising alternate emotions of pity and disgust, may serve to 
illustrate this remark. They trample on virgin bashfulness with a sort of 
bravado, and glorying in their shame, become more audaciously lewd than 
men, however depraved, to whom this sexual quality has not been 
gratuitously granted, ever appear to be. But these poor ignorant wretches 
never had any modesty to lose, when they consigned themselves to infamy; 
for modesty is a virtue not a quality. No, they were only bashful, shame-
faced innocents; and losing their innocence, their shame-facedness was 
rudely brushed off; a virtue would have left some vestiges in the mind, 
had it been sacrificed to passion, to make us respect the grand ruin.

Purity of mind, or that genuine delicacy, which is the only virtuous 
support of chastity, is near akin to that refinement of humanity, which 
never resides in any but cultivated minds. It is something nobler than 
innocence; it is the delicacy of reflection, and not the coyness of 
ignorance.

The reserve of reason, which, like habitual cleanliness, is seldom seen in 
any great degree, unless the soul is active, may easily be distinguished 
from rustic shyness or wanton skittishness; and, so far from being 
incompatible with knowledge, it is its fairest fruit. What a gross idea of 
modesty had the writer of the following remark! 'The lady who asked the 
question whether women may be instructed in the modern system of botany, 
consistently with female delicacy? -- was accused of ridiculous prudery: 
nevertheless, if she had proposed the question to me, I should certainly 
have answered -- They cannot.' Thus is the fair book of knowledge to be 
shut with an everlasting seal! On reading similar passages I have 
reverentially lifted up my eyes and heart to Him who liveth for ever and 
ever, and said, O my Father, hast Thou, by the very constitution of her 
nature forbid Thy child to seek Thee in the fair forms of truth? And, can 
her soul be sullied by the knowledge that awfully calls her to Thee?

I have then philosophically pursued these reflections till I inferred that 
those women who have most improved their reason must have the most 
modesty -- though a dignified sedateness of deportment may have succeeded 
the playful, bewitching bashfulness of youth.(2) 

And thus have I argued. To render chastity the virtue from which 
unsophisticated modesty will naturally flow, the attention should be 
called away from employments which only exercise the sensibility; and the 
heart made to beat time to humanity, rather than to throb with love. The 
woman who has dedicated a considerable portion of her time to pursuits 
purely intellectual, and whose affections have been exercised by humane 
plans of usefulness, must have more purity of mind, as a natural 
consequence, than the ignorant beings whose time and thoughts have been 
occupied by gay pleasures or schemes to conquer hearts.(3) The regulation 
of the behaviour is not modesty, though those who study rules of decorum 
are, in general, termed modest women. Make the heart clean, let it expand 
and feel for all that is human, instead of being narrowed by selfish 
passions; and let the mind frequently contemplate subjects that exercise 
the understanding, without heating the imagination, and artless modesty 
will give the finishing touches to the picture.

She who can discern the dawn of immortality, in the streaks that shoot 
athwart the misty night of ignorance, promising a clearer day, will 
respect, as a sacred temple, the body that enshrines such an improvable 
soul. True love, likewise, spreads this kind of mysterious sanctity round 
the beloved object, making the lover most modest when in her presence.(4) 
So reserved is affection that, receiving or returning personal 
endearments, it wishes, not only to shun the human eye, as a kind of 
profanation, but to diffuse an encircling cloudy obscurity to shut out 
even the saucy sparkling sunbeams. Yet, that affection does not deserve 
the epithet of chaste, which does not receive a sublime gloom of tender 
melancholy, that allows the mind for a moment to stand still and enjoy the 
present satisfaction, when a consciousness of the Divine presence is 
felt -- for this must ever be the food of joy!

As I have always been fond of tracing to its source in nature any 
prevailing custom, I have frequently thought that it was a sentiment of 
affection for whatever had touched the person of an absent or lost friend, 
which gave birth to that respect for relicks, so much abused by selfish 
priests. Devotion, or love, may be allowed to hallow the garments as well 
as the person; for the lover must want fancy who has not a sort of sacred 
respect for the glove or slipper of his mistress. He could not confound 
them with vulgar things of the same kind. This fine sentiment, perhaps, 
would not bear to be analyzed by the experimental philosopher -- but of 
such stuff is human rapture made up! -- A shadowy phantom glides before 
us, obscuring every other object; yet when the soft cloud is grasped, the 
form melts into common air, leaving a solitary void, or sweet perfume, 
stolen from the violet, that memory long holds dear. But I have tripped 
unawares on fairy ground, feeling the balmy gale of spring stealing on me, 
though November frowns.

As a sex, women are more chaste than men, and as modesty is the effect of 
chastity, they may deserve to have this virtue ascribed to them in rather 
an appropriated sense; yet, I must be allowed to add an hesitating if: -- 
for I doubt whether chastity will produce modesty, though it may propriety 
of conduct, when it is merely a respect for the opinion of the world,(5) 
and when coquetry and the lovelorn tales of novelists employ the thoughts. 
Nay, from experience and reason, I should be led to expect to meet with 
more modesty amongst men than women, simply because men exercise their 
understandings more than women.

But, with respect to propriety of behaviour, excepting one class of 
females, women have evidently the advantage. What can be more disgusting 
than that impudent dross of gallantry, thought so manly, which makes many 
men stare insultingly at every female they meet? Is this respect for the 
sex? This loose behaviour shews such habitual depravity, such weakness of 
mind, that it is vain to expect much public or private virtue, till both 
men and women grow more modest -- till men, curbing a sensual fondness for 
the sex, or an affectation of manly assurance, more properly speaking, 
impudence, treat each other with respect -- unless appetite or passion 
give the tone, peculiar to it, to their behaviour. I mean even personal 
respect -- the modest respect of humanity, and fellow-feeling -- not the 
the libidinous mockery of gallantry, nor the insolent condescension of 
protectorship.

To carry the observation still further, modesty must heartily disclaim, 
and refuse to dwell with that debauchery of mind, which leads a man coolly 
to bring forward, without a blush, indecent allusions, or obscene 
witticisms, in the presence of a fellow creature; women are now out of the 
question, for then it is brutality. Respect for man, as man, is the 
foundation of every noble sentiment. How much more modest is the libertine 
who obeys the call of appetite or fancy, than the lewd joker who sets the 
table in a roar!

This is one of the many instances in which the sexual distinction 
respecting modesty has proved fatal to virtue and happiness. It is, 
however, carried still further, and woman, weak woman! made by her 
education the slave of sensibility, is required, on the most trying 
occasions, to resist that sensibility. 'Can any thing,' says Knox, 'be 
more absurd than keeping women in a state of ignorance, and yet so 
vehemently to insist on their resisting temptation?' -- Thus when virtue 
or honour make it proper to check a passion, the burden is thrown on the 
weaker shoulders, contrary to reason and true modesty, which, at least, 
should render the self-denial mutual, to say nothing of the generosity of 
bravery, supposed to be a manly virtue.

In the same strain runs Rousseau's and Dr. Gregory's advice respecting 
modesty, strangely miscalled! for they both desire a wife to leave it in 
doubt whether sensibility or weakness led her to her husband's arms. -- 
The woman is immodest who can let the shadow of such a doubt remain in her 
husband's mind a moment.

But to state the subject in a different light. -- The want of modesty, 
which I principally deplore as subversive of morality, arises from the 
state of warfare so strenuously supported by voluptuous men as the very 
essence of modesty, though, in fact, its bane; because it is a refinement 
on sensual desire, that men fall into who have not sufficient virtue to 
relish the innocent pleasures of love. A man of delicacy carries his 
notions of modesty still further, for neither weakness nor sensibility 
will gratify him -- he looks for affection.

Again; men boast of their triumphs over women, what do they boast of? 
Truly the creature of sensibility was surprised by her sensibility into 
folly -into vice;(6) and the dreadful reckoning falls heavily on her own 
weak head, when reason wakes. For where art thou to find comfort, forlorn 
and disconsolate one? He who ought to have directed thy reason, and 
supported thy weakness, has betrayed thee! In a dream of passion thou 
consentedst to wander through flowery lawns, and heedlessly stepping over 
the precipice to which thy guide, instead of guarding, lured thee, thou 
startest from thy dream only to face a sneering, frowning world, and to 
find thyself alone in a waste, for he that triumphed in thy weakness is 
now pursuing new conquests; but for thee -- there is no redemption on this 
side the grave! And what resource hast thou in an enervated mind to raise 
a sinking heart?

But, if the sexes are really to live in a state of warfare, if nature have 
pointed it out, let them act nobly, or let pride whisper to them, that the 
victory is mean when they merely vanquish sensibility. The real conquest 
is that over affection not taken by surprise -- when, like Heloisa, a 
woman gives up all the world, deliberately, for love. I do not now 
consider the wisdom or virtue of such a sacrifice, I only contend that it 
was a sacrifice to affection, and not merely to sensibility, though she 
had her share. -And I must be allowed to call her a modest woman, before I 
dismiss this part of the subject, by saying, that till men are more chaste 
women will be immodest. Where, indeed, could modest women find husbands 
from whom they would not continually turn with disgust? Modesty must be 
equally cultivated by both sexes, or it will ever remain a sickly hot-
house plant, whilst the affectation of it, the fig leaf borrowed by 
wantonness, may give a zest to voluptuous enjoyments.

Men will probably still insist that woman ought to have more modesty than 
man; but it is not dispassionate reasoners who will most earnestly oppose 
my opinion. No, they are the men of fancy, the favourites of the sex, who 
outwardly respect and inwardly despise the weak creatures whom they thus 
sport with. They cannot submit to resign the highest sensual 
gratification, nor even to relish the epicurism of virtue -- self-denial.

To take another view of the subject, confining my remarks to women.

The ridiculous falsities(7) which are told to children, from mistaken 
notions of modesty, tend very early to inflame their imaginations and set 
their little minds to work, respecting subjects, which nature never 
intended they should think of till the body arrived at some degree of 
maturity; then the passions naturally begin to take the place of the 
senses, as instruments to unfold the understanding, and form the moral 
character.

In nurseries, and boarding-schools, I fear, girls are first spoiled; 
particularly in the latter. A number of girls sleep in the same room, and 
wash together. And, though I should be sorry to contaminate an innocent 
creature's mind by instilling false delicacy, or those indecent prudish 
notions, which early cautions respecting the other sex naturally engender,

I should be very anxious to prevent their acquiring indelicate, or 
immodest habits; and as many girls have learned very indelicate tricks, 
from ignorant servants, the mixing them thus indiscriminately together, is 
very improper.

To say the truth women are, in general, too familiar with each other, 
which leads to that gross degree of familiarity that so frequently renders 
the marriage state unhappy. Why in the name of decency are sisters, female 
intimates, or ladies and their waiting-women, to be so grossly familiar as 
to forget the respect which one human creature owes to another? That 
squeamish delicacy which shrinks from the most disgusting offices when 
affection(8) or humanity lead us to watch at a sick pillow, is despicable. 
But, why women in health should be more familiar with each other than men 
are, when they boast of their superiour delicacy, is a solecism in manners 
which I could never solve.

In order to preserve health and beauty, I should earnestly recommend 
frequent ablutions, to dignify my advice that it may not offend the 
fastidious ear; and, by example, girls ought to be taught to wash and 
dress alone, without, any distinction of rank; and if custom should make 
them require some little assistance, let them not require it till that 
part of the business is over which ought never to be done before a fellow-
creature; because it is an insult to the majesty of human nature. Not on 
the score of modesty, but decency; for the care which some modest women 
take, making at the same time a display of that care, not to let their 
legs be seen, is as childish as immodest.(9)

I could proceed still further, till I animadverted on some still more 
indelicate customs, which men never fall into. Secrets are told -- where 
silence ought to reign; and that regard to cleanliness, which some 
religious sects have, perhaps, carried too far, especially the Essenes, 
amongst the Jews, by making that an insult to God which is only an insult 
to humanity, is violated in a beastly manner. How can delicate women 
obtrude on notice that part of the animal economy, which is so very 
disgusting? And is it not very rational to conclude, that the women who 
have not been taught to respect the human nature of their own sex, in 
these particulars, will not long respect the mere difference of sex in 
their husbands? After their maidenish bashfulness is once lost, I, in 
fact, have generally observed, that women fall into old habits; and treat 
their husbands as they did their sisters or female acquaintance.

Besides, women from necessity, because their minds are not cultivated, 
have recourse very often to what I familiarly term bodily wit; and their 
intimacies are of the same kind. In short, with respect to both mind and 
body, they are too intimate. That decent personal reserve which is the 
foundation of dignity of character, must be kept up between women, or 
their minds will never gain strength or modesty.

On this account also, I object to many females being shut up together in 
nurseries, schools, or convents. I cannot recollect without indignation, 
the jokes and hoiden tricks, which knots of young women indulge themselves 
in, when in my youth accident threw me, an awkward rustic, in their way. 
They were almost on a par with the double meanings, which shake the 
convivial table when the glass has circulated freely. But, it is vain to 
attempt to keep the heart pure, unless the head is furnished with ideas, 
and set to work to compare them, in order to acquire judgment, by 
generalizing simple ones; and modesty, by making the understanding damp 
the sensibility.

It may be thought that I lay too great a stress on personal reserve; but 
it is ever the handmaid of modesty. So that were I to name the graces that 
ought to adorn beauty, I should instantly exclaim, cleanliness, neatness, 
and personal reserve. It is obvious, I suppose, that the reserve I mean, 
has nothing sexual in it, and that I think it equally necessary in both 
sexes. So necessary, indeed, is that reserve and cleanliness which 
indolent women too often neglect, that I will venture to affirm that when 
two or three women live in the same house, the one will be most respected 
by the male part of the family, who reside with them, leaving love 
entirely out of the question, who pays this kind of habitual respect to 
her person.

When domestic friends meet in a morning, there will naturally prevail an 
affectionate seriousness, especially, if each look forward to the 
discharge of daily duties; and, it may be reckoned fanciful, but this 
sentiment has frequently risen spontaneously in my mind, I have been 
pleased after breathing the sweet bracing morning air, to see the same 
kind of freshness in the countenances I particularly loved; I was glad to 
see them braced, as it were, for the day, and ready to run their course 
with the sun. The greetings of affection in the morning are by these means 
more respectful than the familiar tenderness which frequently prolongs the 
evening talk. Nay, I have often felt hurt, not to say disgusted, when a 
friend has appeared, whom I parted with full dressed the evening before, 
with her clothes huddled on, because she chose to indulge herself in bed 
till the last moment.

Domestic affection can only be kept alive by these neglected attentions; 
yet if men and women took half as much pains to dress habitually neat, as 
they do to ornament, or rather to disfigure, their persons, much would be 
done towards the attainment of purity of mind. But women only dress to 
gratify men of gallantry; for the lover is always best pleased with the 
simple garb that fits close to the shape. There is an impertinence in 
ornaments that rebuffs affection; because love always clings round the 
idea of home.

As a sex, women are habitually indolent; and every thing tends to make 
them so. I do not forget the spurts of activity which sensibility 
produces; but as these flights of feelings only increase the evil, they 
are not to be confounded with the slow, orderly walk of reason. So great 
in reality is their mental and bodily indolence, that till their body be 
strengthened and their understanding enlarged by active exertions, there 
is little reason to expect that modesty will take place of bashfulness. 
They may find it prudent to assume its semblance; but the fair veil will 
only be worn on gala days.

Perhaps there is not a virtue that mixes so kindly with every other as 
modesty. -- It is the pale moon-beam that renders more interesting every 
virtue it softens, giving mild grandeur to the contracted horizon. Nothing 
can be more beautiful than the poetical fiction, which makes Diana with 
her silver crescent, the goddess of chastity. I have sometimes thought, 
that wandering with sedate step in some lonely recess, a modest dame of 
antiquity must have felt a glow of conscious dignity when, after 
contemplating the soft shadowy landscaper, she has invited with placid 
fervour the mild reflection of her sisters beams to turn to her chaste 
bosom.

A Christian has still nobler motives to incite her to preserve her 
chastity and acquire modesty, for her body has been called the Temple of 
the living God; of that God who requires more than modesty of mien. His 
eye searcheth the heart; and let her remember, that if she hopeth to find 
favour in the sight of purity itself, her chastity must be founded on 
modesty and not on worldly prudence; or verily a good reputation will be 
her only reward; for that awful intercourse, that sacred communication, 
which virtue establishes between man and his Maker, must give rise to the 
wish of being pure as he is pure!

After the foregoing remarks, it is almost superfluous to add, that I 
consider all those feminine airs of maturity, which succeed bashfulness, 
to which truth is sacrificed, to secure the heart of a husband, or rather 
to force him to be still a lover when nature would, had she not been 
interrupted in her operations, have made love give place to friendship, as 
immodest. The tenderness which a man will feel for the mother of his 
children is an excellent substitute for the ardour of unsatisfied passion; 
but to prolong that ardour it is indelicate, not to say immodest, for 
women to feign an unnatural coldness of constitution. Women as well as men 
ought to have the common appetites and passions of their nature, they are 
only brutal when unchecked by reason: but the obligation to check them is 
the duty of mankind, not a sexual duty. Nature, in these respects, may 
safely be left to herself; let women only acquire knowledge and humanity, 
and love will teach them modesty.(10) There is no need of falsehoods, 
disgusting as futile, for studied rules of behaviour only impose on 
shallow observers; a man of sense soon sees through, and despises the 
affectation.

The behaviour of young people, to each other, as men and women, is the 
last thing that should be thought of in education. In fact, behaviour in 
most circumstances is now so much thought of, that simplicity of character 
is rarely to be seen: yet, if men were only anxious to cultivate each 
virtue, and let it take root firmly in the mind, the grace resulting from 
it, its natural exteriour mark, would soon strip affectation of its 
flaunting plumes; because, fallacious as unstable, is the conduct that is 
not founded upon truth!

Would ye, O my sisters, really possess modesty, ye must remember that the 
possession of virtue, of any denomination, is incompatible with ignorance 
and vanity! ye must acquire that soberness of mind, which the exercise of 
duties, and the pursuit of knowledge, alone inspire, or ye will still 
remain in a doubtful dependent situation, and only be loved whilst ye are 
fair!

The downcast eye, the rosy blush, the retiring grace, are all proper in 
their season; but modesty, being the child of reason, cannot long exist 
with the sensibility that is not tempered by reflection. Besides, when 
love, even innocent love, is the whole employ of your lives, your hearts 
will be too soft to afford modesty that tranquil retreat, where she 
delights to dwell, in close union with humanity.

(1. 'Such is the country-maiden's fright,
When first a red-coat is in sight;
Behind the door she hides her face;
Next time at distance eyes the lace;
She now can all his terrors stand,
Nor from his squeeze withdraws her hand.
She plays familiar in his arms,
And ev'ry soldier hath his charms;
From tent to tent she spreads her flame;
For custom conquers fear and shame.'
--Gay.)

(2. Modesty, is the graceful calm virtue of maturity; bashfulness, the 
charm of vivacious youth.)

(3. I have conversed, as man with man, with medical men, on anatomical 
subjects; and compared the proportions of the human body with artists -- 
yet such modesty did I meet with, that I was never reminded by word or 
look of my sex, of the absurd rules which make modesty a pharisaical cloak 
of weakness. And I am persuaded that in the pursuit of knowledge women 
would never be insulted by sensible men, and rarely by men of any 
description, if they did not by mock modesty remind them that they were 
women: actuated by the same spirit as the Portuguese ladies, who would 
think their charms insulted, if, when left alone with a man, he did not, 
at least, attempt to be very familiar with their persons. Men are not 
always men in the company of women, nor would women always remember that 
they are women, if they were allowed to acquire more understanding.)

(4. Male or female; for the world contains many modest men.)

(5. The immodest behaviour of many married women, who are nevertheless 
faithful to their husbands' beds, will illustrate this remark.)

(6. The poor moth fluttering round a candle, burns its wings.)

(7. Children very early see cats with their kittens, birds with their 
young ones, &c. Why then are they not to be told that their mothers carry 
and nourish them in the same way? As there would then be no appearance of 
mystery they would never think of the subject more. Truth may always be 
told to children, if it be told gravely; but it is the immodesty of 
affected modesty, that does all the mischief; and this smoke heats the 
imagination by vainly endeavouring to obsure certain objects. If, indeed, 
children could be kept entirely from improper company, we should never 
allude to any such subjects; but as this is impossible, it is best to tell 
them the truth, especially as such information, not interesting them, will 
make no impression on their imagination.)

(8. Affection would rather make one choose to perform these offices, to 
spare the delicacy of a friend, by still keeping a veil over them, for the 
personal helplessness, produced by sickness, is of an humbling nature.)

(9. I remember to have met with a sentence, in a book of education, that 
made me smile: 'It would be needless to caution you against putting your 
hand, by chance, under your neck-handkerchief; for a modest woman never 
did so!')

(10. The behaviour of many newly married women has often disgusted me. 
They seem anxious never to let their husbands forget the privilege of 
marriage; and to find no pleasure in his society unless he is acting the 
lover. Short, indeed, must be the reign of love, when the flame is thus 
constantly blown up, without its receiving any solid fuel!)



CHAPTER VIII. MORALITY UNDERMINED BY SEXUAL NOTIONS OF THE IMPORTANCE OF A 
GOOD REPUTATION.

IT has long since occurred to me that advice respecting behaviour, and all 
the various modes of preserving a good reputation, which have been so 
strenuously inculcated on the female world, were specious poisons, that 
incrusting morality eat away the substance. And, that this measuring of 
shadows produced a false calculation, because their length depends so much 
on the height of the sun, and other adventitious circumstances.

From whence arises the easy fallacious behaviour of a courtier? From his 
situation, undoubtedly: for standing in need of dependents, he is obliged 
to learn the art of denying without giving offence, and, of evasively 
feeding hope with the chameleon's food: thus does politeness sport with 
truth, and eating away the sincerity and humanity natural to man, produce 
the fine gentleman.

Women in the same way acquire, from a supposed necessity, an equally 
artificial mode of behaviour. Yet truth is not with impunity to be sported 
with, for the practised dissembler, at last, become the dupe of his own 
arts, loses that sagacity, which has been justly termed common sense; 
namely a quick perception of common truths: which are constantly received 
as such by the unsophisticated mind, though it might not have had 
sufficient energy to discover them itself, when obscured by local 
prejudices. The greater number of people take their opinions on trust to 
avoid the trouble of exercising their own minds, and these indolent beings 
naturally adhere to the letter, rather than the spirit of a law, divine or 
human. 'Women,' says some author, I cannot recollect who, 'mind not what 
only heaven sees.' Why, indeed should they? it is the eye of man that they 
have been taught to dread -- and if they can lull their Argus to sleep, 
they seldom think of heaven or themselves, because their reputation is 
safe; and it is reputation, not chastity and all its fair train, that they 
are employed to keep free from spot, not as a virtue, but to preserve 
their station in the world.

To prove the truth of this remark, I need only advert to the intrigues of 
married women, particularly in high life, and in countries where women are 
suitably married, according to their respective ranks, by their parents. 
If an innocent girl become a prey to love, she is degraded forever, though 
her mind was not polluted by the arts which married women, under the 
convenient cloak of marriage, practise; nor has she violated any duty -- 
but the duty of respecting herself. The married woman, on the contrary, 
breaks a most sacred engagement, and becomes a cruel mother when she is a 
false and faithless wife. If her husband has still an affection for her, 
the arts which she must practise to deceive him, will render her the most 
contemptible of human beings; and, at any rate, the contrivances necessary 
to preserve appearances, will keep her mind in that childish, or vicious, 
tumult, which destroys all its energy. Besides, in time, like those people 
who habitually take cordials to raise their spirits, she will want an 
intrigue to give life to her thoughts, having lost all relish for 
pleasures that are not highly seasoned by hope or fear.

Sometimes married women act still more audaciously; I will mention an 
instance.

A woman of quality, notorious for her gallantries, though as she still 
lived with her husband, nobody chose to place her in the class where she 
ought to have been placed, made a point of treating with the most 
insulting contempt a poor timid creature, abashed by a sense of her former 
weakness, whom a neighbouring gentleman had seduced and afterwards 
married. This woman had actually confounded virtue with reputation; and, I 
do believe, valued herself on the propriety of her behaviour before 
marriage, though when once settled, to the satisfaction of her family, she 
and her lord were equally faithless, -- so that the half alive heir to an 
immense estate, came from heaven knows where! 

To view this subject in another light.

I have known a number of women who, if they did not love their husbands, 
loved nobody else, give themselves entirely up to vanity and dissipation, 
neglecting every domestic duty; nay, even squandering away all the money 
which should have been saved for their helpless younger children, yet have 
plumed themselves on their unsullied reputation, as if the whole compass 
of their duty as wives and mothers was only to preserve it. Whilst other 
indolent women neglecting every personal duty, have thought that they 
deserved their husband's affection, because they asked in this respect 
with propriety.

Weak minds are always fond of resting in the ceremonials of duty, but 
morality offers much simpler motives; and it were to be wished that 
superficial moralists had said less respecting behaviour, and outward 
observances, for unless virtue, of any kind, is built on knowledge, it 
will only produce a kind of insipid decency. Respect for the opinion of 
the world, has, however, been termed the principal duty of woman in the 
most express words, for Rousseau declares, 'that reputation is no less 
indispensable than chastity.' 'A man,' adds he, 'secure in his own good 
conduct, depends only on himself, and may brave the public opinion; but a 
woman, in behaving well, performs but half her duty; as what is thought of 
her, is as important to her as what she really is. It follows hence, that 
the system of a woman's education should, in this respect, be directly 
contrary to that of ours. Opinion is the grave of virtue among the men; 
but its throne among women.' It is strictly logical to infer that the 
virtue that rests on opinion is merely worldly, and that it is the virtue 
of a being to whom reason has been denied. But, even with respect to the 
opinion of the world, I am convinced that this class of reasoners are 
mistaken. 

This regard for reputation, independent of its being one of the natural 
rewards of virtue, however, took its rise from a cause that I have already 
deplored as the grand source of female depravity, the impossibility of 
regaining respectability by a return to virtue, though men preserve theirs 
during the indulgence of vice. It was natural for women then to endeavour 
to preserve what once lost -- was lost for ever, till this care swallowing 
up every other care, reputation for chastity, became the one thing needful 
to the sex. But vain is the scrupulosity of ignorance, for neither 
religion nor virtue, when they reside in the heart, require such a puerile 
attention to mere ceremonies, because the behaviour must, upon the whole, 
be proper, when the motive is pure.

To support my opinion I can produce very respectable authority; and the 
authority of a cool reasoner ought to have weight to enforce 
consideration, though not to establish a sentiment. Speaking of the 
general laws of morality, Dr. Smith observes, -- 'That by some very 
extraordinary and unlucky circumstance, a good man may come to be 
suspected of a crime of which he was altogether incapable, and upon that 
account be most unjustly exposed for the remaining part of his life to the 
horror and aversion of mankind. By an accident of this kind he may be said 
to lose his all, notwithstanding his integrity and justice, in the same 
manner as a cautious man, notwithstanding his utmost circumspection, may 
be ruined by an earthquake or an inundation. Accidents of the first kind, 
however, are perhaps still more rare, and still more contrary to the 
common course of things than those of the second; and it still remains 
true, that the practice of truth, justice, and humanity, is a certain and 
almost infallible method of acquiring what those virtues chiefly aim at, 
the confidence and love of those we live with. A person may be easily 
misrepresented with regard to a particular action; but it is scarcely 
possible that he should be so with regard to the general tenor of his 
conduct. An innocent man may be believed to have done wrong: this, 
however, will rarely happen. On the contrary, the established opinion of 
the innocence of his manners will often lead us to absolve him where he 
has really been in the fault, notwithstanding very strong presumptions.'

I perfectly coincide in opinion with this writer, for I verily believe 
that few of either sex were ever despised for certain vices without 
deserving to be despised. I speak not of the calumny of the moment, which 
hangs over a character, like one of the dense fogs of November, over this 
metropolis, till it gradually subsides before the common light of day, I 
only contend that the daily conduct of the majority prevails to stamp 
their character with the impression of truth. Quietly does the clear 
light, shining day after day, refute the ignorant surmise, or malicious 
tale, which has thrown dirt on a pure character. A false light distorted, 
for a short time, its shadow -- reputation; but it seldom fails to become 
just when the cloud is dispersed that produced the mistake in vision.

Many people, undoubtedly, in several respects obtain a better reputation 
than, strictly speaking, they deserve; for unremitting industry will 
mostly reach its goal in all races. They who only strive for this paltry 
prize, like the Pharisees, who prayed at the corners of streets, to be 
seen of men, verily obtain the reward they seek; for the heart of man 
cannot be read by man! Still the fair fame that is naturally reflected by 
good actions, when the man is only employed to direct his steps aright, 
regardless of the lookers-on, is, in general, not only more true, but more 
sure.

There are, it is true, trials when the good man must appeal to God from 
the injustice of man; and amidst the whining candour or hissings of envy, 
erect a pavilion in his own mind to retire to till the rumour be overpast; 
nay, the darts of undeserved censure may pierce an innocent tender bosom 
through with many sorrows; but these are all exceptions to general rules. 
And it is according to these common laws that human behaviour ought to be 
regulated. The eccentric orbit of the comet never influences astronomical 
calculations respecting the invariable order established in the motion of 
the principal bodies of the solar system.

I will then venture to affirm, that after a man is arrived at maturity, 
the general outline of his character in the world is just, allowing for 
the before-mentioned exceptions to the rule. I do not say that a prudent, 
worldly-wise man, with only negative virtues and qualities, may not 
sometimes obtain a more smooth reputation than a wiser or a better man. So 
far from it, that I am apt to conclude from experience, that where the 
virtue of two people is nearly equal, the most negative character will be 
liked best by the world at large, whilst the other may have more friends 
in private life. But the hills and dales, clouds and sunshine, conspicuous 
in the virtues of great men, set off each other; and though they afford 
envious weakness a fairer mark to shoot at, the real character will still 
work its way to light, though bespattered by weak affection, or ingenious 
malice.(1)

With respect to that anxiety to preserve a reputation hardly earned, which 
leads sagacious people to analyze it, I shall not make the obvious 
comment; but I am afraid that morality is very insidiously undermined, in 
the female world, by the attention being turned to the shew instead of the 
substance. A simple thing is thus made strangely complicated; nay, 
sometimes virtue and its shadow are set at variance. We should never, 
perhaps, have heard of Lucretia, had she died to preserve her chastity 
instead of her reputation. If we really deserve our own good opinion we 
shall commonly be respected in the world; but if we pant after higher 
improvement and higher attainments, it is not sufficient to view ourselves 
as we suppose that we are viewed by others, though this has been 
ingeniously argued, as the foundation of our moral sentiments.(2) Because 
each by-stander may have his own prejudices, beside the prejudices of his 
age or country. We should rather endeavour to view ourselves as we suppose 
that Being views us who seeth each thought ripen into action, and whose 
judgment never swerves from the eternal rule of right. Righteous are all 
his judgments -- just as merciful!

The humble mind that seeketh to find favour in His sight, and calmly 
examines its conduct when only His presence is felt, will seldom form a 
very erroneous opinion of its own virtues. During the still hour of self-
collection the angry brow of offended justice will be fearfully 
deprecated, or the tie which draws man to the Deity will be recognized in 
the pure sentiment of reverential adoration, that swells the heart without 
exciting any tumultuous emotions. In these solemn moments man discovers 
the germ of those vices, which like the Java tree shed a pestiferous 
vapour around -- death is in the shade! and he perceives them without 
abhorrence, because he feels himself drawn by some cord of love to all his 
fellow-creatures, for whose follies he is anxious to find every 
extenuation in their nature -- in himself. If I, he may thus argue, who 
exercise my own mind, and have been refined by tribulation, find the 
serpent's egg in some fold of my heart, and crush it with difficulty, 
shall not I pity those who have stamped with less vigour, or who have 
heedlessly nurtured the insidious reptile till it poisoned the vital 
stream it sucked? Can I, conscious of my secret sins, throw off my fellow-
creatures, and calmly see them drop into the chasm of perdition, that 
yawns to receive them. -- No! no! The agonized heart will cry with 
suffocating impatience -- I too am a man! and have vices, hid, perhaps, 
from human eye, that bend me to the dust before God, and loudly tell me, 
when all is mute, that we are formed of the same earth, and breathe the 
same element. Humanity thus rises naturally out of humility, and twists 
the cords of love that in various convolutions entangle the heart.

This sympathy extends still further, till a man well pleased observes 
force in arguments that do not carry conviction to his own bosom, and he 
gladly places in the fairest light, to himself, the shews of reason that 
have led others astray, rejoiced to find some reason in all the errors of 
man; though before convinced that he who rules the day makes his sun to 
shine on all. Yet, shaking hands thus as it were with corruption, one foot 
on earth, the other with bold stride mounts to heaven, and claims kindred 
with superior natures. Virtues, unobserved by man, drop their balmy 
fragrance at this cool hour, and the thirsty land, refreshed by the pure 
streams of comfort that suddenly gush out, is crowned with smiling 
verdure; this is the living green, on which that eye may look with 
complacency that is too pure to behold iniquity!

But my spirits flag; and I must silently indulge the reverie these 
reflections lead to, unable to describe the sentiments, that have calmed 
my soul, when watching the rising sun, a soft shower drizzling through the 
leaves of neighbouring trees, seemed to fall on my languid, yet tranquil 
spirits, to cool the heart that had been heated by the passions which 
reason laboured to tame.

The leading principles which run through all my disquisitions, would 
render it unnecessary to enlarge on this subject, if a constant attention 
to keep the varnish of the character fresh, and in good condition, were 
not often inculcated as the sum total of female duty; if rules to regulate 
the behaviour, and to preserve the reputation, did not too frequently 
supersede moral obligations. But, with respect to reputation, the 
attention is confined to a single virtue -- chastity. If the honour of a 
woman, as it is absurdly called, is safe, she may neglect every social 
duty; nay, ruin her family by gaming and extravagance; yet still present a 
shameless front -- for truly she is an honourable woman!

Mrs. Macaulay has justly observed, that 'there is but one fault which a 
woman of honour may not commit with impunity.' She then justly, and 
humanely adds -- 'This has given rise to the trite and foolish 
observation, that the first fault against chastity in woman has a radical 
power to deprave the character. But no such frail beings come out of the 
hands of nature. The human mind is built of nobler materials than to be so 
easily corrupted; and with all their disadvantages of situation and 
education, women seldom become entirely abandoned till they are thrown 
into a state of desperation, by the venomous rancour of their own sex.'

But, in proportion as this regard for the reputation of chastity is prized 
by women, it is despised by men: and the two extremes are equally 
destructive to morality.

Men are certainly more under the influence of their appetites than women; 
and their appetites are more depraved by unbridled indulgence and the 
fastidious contrivances of satiety. Luxury has introduced a refinement in 
eating, that destroys the constitution; and a degree of gluttony which is 
so beastly, that a perception of seemliness of behaviour must be worn out 
before one being could eat immoderately in the presence of another, and 
afterwards complain of the oppression that his intemperance naturally 
produced. Some women, particularly French women, have also lost a sense of 
decency in this respect; for they will talk very calmly of an indigestion. 
It were to be wished that idleness was not allowed to generate, on the 
rank soil of wealth, those swarms of summer insects that feed on 
putrefaction, we should not then be disgusted by the sight of such brutal 
excesses.

There is one rule relative to behaviour that, I think, ought to regulate 
every other; and it is simply to cherish such an habitual respect for 
mankind as may prevent us from disgusting a fellow-creature for the sake 
of a present indulgence. The shameful indolence of many married women, and 
others a little advanced in life, frequently leads them to sin against 
delicacy. For, though convinced that the person is the band of union 
between the sexes, yet, how often do they from sheer indolence, or, to 
enjoy some trifling indulgence, disgust?

The depravity of the appetite which brings the sexes together, has had a 
still more fatal effect. Nature must ever be the standard of taste, the 
gauge of appetite -- yet how grossly is nature insulted by the voluptuary. 
Leaving the refinements of love out of the question; nature, by making the 
gratification of an appetite, in this respect, as well as every other, a 
natural and imperious law to preserve the species, exalts the appetite, 
and mixes a little mind and affection with a sensual gust. The feelings of 
a parent mingling with an instinct merely animal, give it dignity; and the 
man and woman often meeting on account of the child, a mutual interest and 
affection is excited by the exercise of a common sympathy. Women then 
having necessarily some duty to fulfil, more noble than to adorn their 
persons, would not contentedly be the slaves of casual appetite; which is 
now the situation of a very considerable number who are, literally 
speaking, standing dishes to which every glutton may have access.

I may be told that great as this enormity is, it only affects a devoted 
part of the sex -- devoted for the salvation of the rest. But, false as 
every assertion might easily be proved, that recommends the sanctioning a 
small evil to produce a greater good; the mischief does not stop here, for 
the moral character, and peace of mind, of the chaster part of the sex, is 
undermined by the conduct of the very women to whom they allow no refuge 
from guilt: whom they inexorably consign to the exercise of arts that lure 
their husbands from them, debauch their sons, and force them, let not 
modest women start, to assume, in some degree, the same character 
themselves. For I will venture to assert, that all the causes of female 
weakness, as well as depravity, which I have already enlarged on, branch 
out of one grand cause -- want of chastity in men.

This intemperance, so prevalent, depraves the appetite to such a degree, 
that a wanton stimulus is necessary to rouse it; but the parental design 
of nature is forgotten, and the mere person, and that for a moment, alone 
engrosses the thoughts. So voluptuous, indeed, often grows the lustful 
prowler, that he refines on female softness. Something more soft than 
woman is then sought for; till, in Italy and Portugal, men attend the 
levees of equivocal beings, to sigh for more than female languor.

To satisfy this genus of men, women are made systematically voluptuous, 
and though they may not all carry their libertinism to the same height, 
yet this heartless intercourse with the sex, which they allow themselves, 
depraves both sexes, because the taste of men is vitiated; and women, of 
all classes, naturally square their behaviour to gratify the taste by 
which they obtain pleasure and power. Women becoming, consequently, 
weaker, in mind and body, than they ought to be, were one of the grand 
ends of their being taken into the account, that of bearing and nursing 
children, have not sufficient strength to discharge the first duty of a 
mother; and sacrificing to lasciviousness the parental affection, that 
ennobles instinct, either destroy the embryo in the womb, or cast it off 
when born. Nature in every thing demands respect, and those who violate 
her laws seldom violate them with impunity. The weak enervated women who 
particularly catch the attention of libertines, are unfit to be mothers, 
though they may conceive; so that the rich sensualist, who has rioted 
among women, spreading depravity and misery, when he wishes to perpetuate 
his name, receives from his wife only an half-formed being that inherits 
both its father's and mother's weakness.

Contrasting the humanity of the present age with the barbarism of 
antiquity, great stress has been laid on the savage custom of exposing the 
children whom their parents could not maintain; whilst the man of 
sensibility, who thus, perhaps, complains, by his promiscuous amours 
produces a most destructive barrenness and contagious flagitiousness of 
manners. Surely nature never intended that women, by satisfying an 
appetite, should frustrate the very purpose for which it was implanted!

I have before observed, that men ought to maintain the women whom they 
have seduced; this would be one means of reforming female manners, and 
stopping an abuse that has an equally fatal effect on population and 
morals. Another, no less obvious, would be to turn the attention of woman 
to the real virtue of chastity; for to little respect has that woman a 
claim, on the score of modesty, though her reputation may be white as the 
driven snow, who smiles on the libertine whilst she spurns the victims of 
his lawless appetites and their own folly.

Besides, she has a taint of the same folly, pure as she esteems herself, 
when she studiously adorns her person only to be seen by men, to excite 
respectful sighs, and all the idle homage of what is called innocent 
gallantry. Did women really respect virtue for its own sake, they would 
not seek for a compensation in vanity, for the self-denial which they are 
obliged to practise to preserve their reputation, nor would they associate 
with men who set reputation at defiance.

The two sexes mutually corrupt and improve each other. This I believe to 
be an indisputable truth, extending it to every virtue. Chastity, modesty, 
public spirit, and all the noble train of virtues, on which social virtue 
and happiness are built, should be understood and cultivated by all 
mankind, or they will be cultivated to little effect. And, instead of 
furnishing the vicious or idle with a pretext for violating some sacred 
duty, by terming it a sexual one, it would be wiser to shew that nature 
has not made any difference, for that the unchaste man doubly defeats the 
purpose of nature, by rendering women barren, and destroying his own 
constitution, though he avoids the shame that pursues the crime in the 
other sex. These are the physical consequences, the moral are still more 
alarming; for virtue is only a nominal distinction when the duties of 
citizens, husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, and directors of families, 
become merely the selfish ties of convenience.

Why then do philosophers look for public spirit? Public spirit must be 
nurtured by private virtue, or it will resemble the factitious sentiment 
which makes women careful to preserve their reputation, and men their 
honour. A sentiment that often exists unsupported by virtue, unsupported 
by that sublime morality which makes the habitual breach of one duty a 
breach of the whole moral law.

(1. I allude to various biographical writings, but particularly to 
Boswell's Life of Johnson.)

(2. Smith.)



CHAPTER IX. OF THE PERNICIOUS EFFECTS WHICH ARISE FROM THE UNNATURAL 
DISTINCTIONS ESTABLISHED IN SOCIETY.

FROM the respect paid to property flow, as from a poisoned fountain, most 
of the evils and vices which render this world such a dreary scene to the 
contemplative mind. For it is in the most polished society that noisome 
reptiles and venomous serpents lurk under the rank herbage; and there is 
voluptuousness pampered by the still sultry air, which relaxes every good 
disposition before it ripens into virtue. 

One class presses on another; for all are aiming to procure respect on 
account of their property: and property, once gained, will procure the 
respect due only to talents and virtue. Men neglect the duties incumbent 
on man, yet are treated like demi-gods; religion is also separated from 
morality by a ceremonial veil, yet men wonder that the world is almost, 
literally speaking, a den of sharpers or oppressors.

There is a homely proverb, which speaks a shrewd truth, that whoever the 
devil finds idle he will employ. And what but habitual idleness can 
hereditary wealth and titles produce? For man is so constituted that he 
can only attain a proper use of his faculties by exercising them, and will 
not exercise them unless necessity, of some kind, first set the wheels in 
motion. Virtue likewise can only be acquired by the discharge of relative 
duties; but the importance of these sacred duties will scarcely be felt by 
the being who is cajoled out of his humanity by the flattery of 
sycophants. There must be more equality established in society, or 
morality will never gain ground, and this virtuous equality will not rest 
firmly even when founded on a rock, if one half of mankind are chained to 
its bottom by fate, for they will be continually undermining it through 
ignorance or pride.

It is vain to expect virtue from women till they are, in some degree, 
independent of men; nay, it is vain to expect that strength of natural 
affection, which would make them good wives and mothers. Whilst they are 
absolutely dependent on their husbands they will be cunning, mean, and 
selfish, and the men who can be gratified by the fawning fondness of 
spaniel-like affection, have not much delicacy, for love is not to be 
bought, in any sense of the words, its silken wings are instantly 
shrivelled up when any thing beside a return in kind is sought. Yet whilst 
wealth enervates men; and women live, as it were, by their personal 
charms, how can we expect them to discharge those ennobling duties which 
equally require exertion and self-denial. Hereditary property 
sophisticates the mind, and the unfortunate victims to it, if I may so 
express myself, swathed from their birth, seldom exert the locomotive 
faculty of body or mind; and, thus viewing every thing through one medium, 
and that a false one, they are unable to discern in what true merit and 
happiness consist. False, indeed, must be the light when the drapery of 
situation hides the man, and makes him stalk in masquerade, dragging from 
one scene of dissipation to another the nerveless limbs that hang with 
stupid listlessness, and rolling round the vacant eye which plainly tells 
us that there is no mind at home.

I mean, therefore, to infer that the society is not properly organized 
which does not compel men and women to discharge their respective duties, 
by making it the only way to acquire that countenance from their fellow-
creatures, which every human being wishes some way to attain. The respect, 
consequently, which is paid to wealth and mere personal charms, is a true 
north-east blast, that blights the tender blossoms of affection and 
virtue. Nature has wisely attached affections to duties, to sweeten toil, 
and to give that vigour to the exertions of reason which only the heart 
can give. But, the affection which is put on merely because it is the 
appropriated insignia of a certain character, when its duties are not 
fulfilled, is one of the empty compliments which vice and folly are 
obliged to pay to virtue and the real nature of things.

To illustrate my opinion, I need only observe, that when a woman is 
admired for her beauty, and suffers herself to be so far intoxicated by 
the admiration she receives, as to neglect to discharge the indispensable 
duty of a mother, she sins against herself by neglecting to cultivate an 
affection that would equally tend to make her useful and happy. True 
happiness, I mean all the contentment, and virtuous satisfaction, that can 
be snatched in this imperfect state, must arise from well regulated 
affections; and an affection includes a duty. Men are not aware of the 
misery they cause, and the vicious weakness they cherish, by only inciting 
women to render themselves pleasing; they do not consider that they thus 
make natural and artificial duties clash, by sacrificing the comfort and 
respectability of a woman's life to voluptuous notions of beauty, when in 
nature they all harmonize.

Cold would be the heart of a husband, were he not rendered unnatural by 
early debauchery, who did not feel more delight at seeing his child 
suckled by its mother, than the most artful wanton tricks could ever 
raise; yet this natural way of cementing the matrimonial tie, and twisting 
esteem with fonder recollections, wealth leads women to spurn. To preserve 
their beauty, and wear the flowery crown of the day, that gives them a 
kind of right to reign for a short time over the sex, they neglect to 
stamp impressions on their husbands' hearts, that would be remembered with 
more tenderness when the snow on the head began to chill the bosom, than 
even their virgin charms. The maternal solicitude of a reasonable 
affectionate woman is very interesting, and the chastened dignity with 
which a mother returns the caresses that she and her child receive from a 
father who has been fulfilling the serious duties of his station, is not 
only a respectable, but a beautiful sight. So singular, indeed, are my 
feelings, and I have endeavoured not to catch factitious ones, that after 
having been fatigued with the sight of insipid grandeur and the slavish 
ceremonies that with cumberous pomp supplied the place of domestic 
affections, I have turned to some other scene to relieve my eye by resting 
it on the refreshing green every where scattered by nature. I have then 
viewed with pleasure a woman nursing her children, and discharging the 
duties of her station with, perhaps, merely a servant maid to take off her 
hands the servile part of the household business. I have seen her prepare 
herself and children, with only the luxury of cleanliness, to receive her 
husband, who returning weary home in the evening found smiling babes and a 
clean hearth. My heart has loitered in the midst of the group, and has 
even throbbed with sympathetic emotion, when the scraping of the well 
known foot has raised a pleasing tumult. 

Whilst my benevolence has been gratified by contemplating this artless 
picture, I have thought that a couple of this description, equally 
necessary and independent of each other, because each fulfilled the 
respective duties of their station, possessed all that life could give. -- 
Raised sufficiently above abject poverty not to be obliged to weigh the 
consequence of every farthing they spend, and having sufficient to prevent 
their attending to a frigid system of economy, which narrows both heart 
and mind. I declare, so vulgar are my conceptions, that I know not what is 
wanted to render this the happiest as well as the most respectable 
situation in the world, but a taste for literature, to throw a little 
variety and interest into social converse, and some superfluous money to 
give to the needy and to buy books. For it is not pleasant when the heart 
is opened by compassion and the head active in arranging plans of 
usefulness, to have a prim urchin continually twitching back the elbow to 
prevent the hand from drawing out an almost empty purse, whispering at the 
same time some prudential maxim about the priority of justice.

Destructive, however, as riches and inherited honours are to the human 
character, women are more debased and cramped, if possible, by them, than 
men, because men may still, in some degree, unfold their faculties by 
becoming soldiers and statesmen.

As soldiers, I grant, they can now only gather, for the most part, vain 
glorious laurels, whilst they adjust to a hair the European balance, 
taking especial care that no bleak northern nook or sound incline the 
beam. But the days of true heroism are over, when a citizen fought for his 
country like a Fabricius or a Washington, and then returned to his farm to 
let his virtuous fervour run in a more placid, but not a less salutary, 
stream. No, our British heroes are oftener sent from the gaming table than 
from the plow; and their passions have been rather inflamed by hanging 
with dumb suspense on the turn of a die, than sublimated by panting after 
the adventurous march of virtue in the historic page.

The statesman, it is true, might with more propriety quit the Faro Bank, 
or card-table, to guide the helm, for he has still but to shuffle and 
trick. The whole system of British politics, if system it may courteously 
be called, consisting in multiplying dependents and contriving taxes which 
grind the poor to pamper the rich; thus a war, or any wild goose chace is, 
as the vulgar use the phrase, a lucky turn-up of patronage for the 
minister, whose chief merit is the art of keeping himself in place.

It is not necessary then that he should have bowels for the poor, so he 
can secure for his family the odd trick. Or should some shew of respect, 
for what is termed with ignorant ostentation an Englishman's birth-right, 
be expedient to bubble the gruff mastiff that he has to lead by the nose, 
he can make an empty shew, very safely, by giving his single voice, and 
suffering his light squadron to file off to the other side. And when a 
question of humanity is agitated he may dip a sop in the milk of human 
kindness, to silence Cerberus, and talk of the interest which his heart 
takes in an attempt to make the earth no longer cry for vengeance as it 
sucks in its children's blood, though his cold hand may at the very moment 
rivet their chains, by sanctioning the abominable traffick. A minister is 
no longer a minister than while he can carry a point, which he is 
determined to carry. -- Yet it is not necessary that a minister should 
feel like a man, when a bold push might shake his seat.

But, to have done with these episodical observations, let me return to the 
more specious slavery which chains the very soul of woman, keeping her for 
ever under the bondage of ignorance.

The preposterous distinctions of rank, which render civilization a curse, 
by dividing the world between voluptuous tyrants, and cunning envious 
dependents, corrupt, almost equally, every class of people, because 
respectability is not attached to the discharge of the relative duties of 
life, but to the station, and when the duties are not fulfilled the 
affections cannot gain sufficient strength to fortify the virtue of which 
they are the natural reward. Still there are some loop-holes out of which 
a man may creep, and dare to think and act for himself; but for a woman it 
is an herculean task, because she has difficulties peculiar to her sex to 
overcome, which require almost super-human powers.

A truly benevolent legislator always endeavours to make it the interest of 
each individual to be virtuous; and thus private virtue becoming the 
cement of public happiness, an orderly whole is consolidated by the 
tendency of all the parts towards a common centre. But, the private or 
public virtue of woman is very problematical; for Rousseau, and a numerous 
list of male writers, insist that she should all her life be subjected to 
a severe restraint, that of propriety. Why subject her to propriety -- 
blind propriety, if she be capable of acting from a nobler spring, if she 
be an heir of immortality? Is sugar always to be produced by vital blood? 
Is one half of the human species, like the poor African slaves, to be 
subject to prejudices that brutalize them, when principles would be a 
surer guard, only to sweeten the cup of man? Is not this indirectly to 
deny woman reason? for a gift is a mockery, if it be unfit for use.

Women are, in common with men, rendered weak and luxurious by the relaxing 
pleasures which wealth procures; but added to this they are made slaves to 
their persons, and must render them alluring that man may lend them his 
reason to guide their tottering steps aright. Or should they be ambitious, 
they must govern their tyrants by sinister tricks, for without rights 
there cannot be any incumbent duties. The laws respecting woman, which I 
mean to discuss in a future part, make an absurd unit of a man and his 
wife; and then, by the easy transition of only considering him as 
responsible, she is reduced to a mere cypher.

The being who discharges the duties of its station is independent; and, 
speaking of women at large, their first duty is to themselves as rational 
creatures, and the next, in point of importance, as citizens, is that, 
which includes so many, of a mother. The rank in life which dispenses with 
their fulfilling this duty, necessarily degrades them by making them mere 
dolls. Or, should they turn to something more important than merely 
fitting drapery upon a smooth block, their minds are only occupied by some 
soft platonic attachment; or, the actual management of an intrigue may 
keep their thoughts in motion; for when they neglect domestic duties, they 
have it not in their power to take the field and march and counter-march 
like soldiers, or wrangle in the senate to keep their faculties from 
rusting.

I know that as a proof of the inferiority of the sex, Rousseau has 
exultingly exclaimed, How can they leave the nursery for the camp! -- And 
the camp has by some moralists been termed the school of the most heroic 
virtues; though, I think, it would puzzle a keen casuist to prove the 
reasonableness of the greater number of wars that have dubbed heroes. I do 
not mean to consider this question critically; because, having frequently 
viewed these freaks of ambition as the first natural mode of civilization, 
when the ground must be torn up, and the woods cleared by fire and sword, 
I do not choose to call them pests; but surely the present system of war 
has little connection with virtue of any denomination, being rather the 
school of finesse and effeminacy, than of fortitude.

Yet, if defensive war, the only justifiable war, in the present advanced 
state of society, where virtue can shew its face and ripen amidst the 
rigours which purify the air on the mountain's top, were alone to be 
adopted as just and glorious, the true heroism of antiquity might again 
animate female bosoms. -- But fair and softly, gentle reader, male or 
female, do not alarm thyself, for though I have contracted the character 
of a modern soldier with that of a civilized woman, I am not going to 
advise them to turn their distaff into a musket, though I sincerely wish 
to see the bayonet concerted into a pruning-hook. I only recreated an 
imagination, fatigued by contemplating the vices and follies which all 
proceed from a feculent stream of wealth that has muddied the pure rills 
of natural affection, by supposing that society will some time or other be 
so constituted, that man must necessarily fulfil the duties of a citizen, 
or be despised, and that while he was employed in any of the departments 
of civil life, his wife, also an active citizen, should be equally intent 
to manage her family, educate her children, and assist her neighbours.

But, to render her really virtuous and useful, she must not, if she 
discharge her civil duties, want, individually, the protection of civil 
laws; she must not be dependent on her husband's bounty for her 
subsistence during his life, or support after his death -- for how can a 
being be generous who has nothing of its own? or, virtuous, who is not 
free? The wife, in the present state of things, who is faithful to her 
husband, and neither suckles nor educates her children, scarcely deserves 
the name of a wife, and has no right to that of a citizen. But take away 
natural rights, and there is of course an end of duties.

Women thus infallibly become only the wanton solace of men, when they are 
so weak in mind and body, that they cannot exert themselves, unless to 
pursue some frothy pleasure, or to invent some frivolous fashion. What can 
be a more melancholy sight to a thinking mind, than to look into the 
numerous carriages that drive helter-skelter about this metropolis in a 
morning full of pale-faced creatures who are flying from themselves. I 
have often wished, with Dr. Johnson, to place some of them in a little 
shop with half a dozen children looking up to their languid countenances 
for support. I am much mistaken, if some latent vigour would not soon give 
health and spirit to their eyes, and some lines drawn by the exercise of 
reason on the blank cheeks, which before were only undulated by dimples, 
might restore lost dignity to the character, or rather enable it to attain 
the true dignity of its nature. Virtue is not to be acquired even by 
speculation, much less by the negative supineness that wealth naturally 
generates.

Besides, when poverty is more disgraceful than even vice, is not morality 
cut to the quick? Still to avoid misconstruction, though I consider that 
women in the common walks of life are called to fulfil the duties of wives 
and mothers, by religion and reason, I cannot help lamenting that women of 
a superiour cast have not a road open by which they can pursue more 
extensive plans of usefulness and independence. I may excite laughter, by 
dropping an hint, which I mean to pursue, some future time, for I really 
think that women ought to have representatives, instead of being 
arbitrarily governed without having any direct share allowed them in the 
deliberations of government.

But, as the whole system of representation is now, in this country, only a 
convenient handle for despotism, they need not complain, for they are as 
well represented as a numerous class of hard working mechanics, who pay 
for the support of royalty when they can scarcely stop their children's 
mouths with bread. How are they represented whose very sweat supports the 
splendid stud of an heir apparent, or varnishes the chariot of some female 
favourite who looks down on shame? Taxes on the very necessaries of life, 
enable an endless tribe of idle princes and princesses to pass with stupid 
pomp before a gaping crowd, who almost worship the very parade which costs 
them so dear. This is mere gothic grandeur, something like the barbarous 
useless parade of having sentinels on horseback at Whitehall, which I 
could never view without a mixture of contempt and indignation.

How strangely must the mind be sophisticated when this sort of state 
impresses it! But, till these monuments of folly are levelled by virtue, 
similar follies will leaven the whole mass. For the same character, in 
some degree, will prevail in the aggregate of society: and the refinements 
of luxury, or the vicious repinings of envious poverty, will equally 
banish virtue from society, considered as the characteristic of that 
society, or only allow it to appear as one of the stripes of the harlequin 
coat, worn by the civilized man.

In the superiour ranks of life, every duty is done by deputies, as if 
duties could ever be waved, and the vain pleasures which consequent 
idleness forces the rich to pursue, appear so enticing to the next rank, 
that the numerous scramblers for wealth sacrifice every thing to tread on 
their heels. The most sacred trusts are then considered as sinecures, 
because they were procured by interest, and only sought to enable a man to 
keep good company. Women, in particular, all want to be ladies. Which is 
simply to have nothing to do, but listlessly to go they scarcely care 
where, for they cannot tell what.

But what have women to do in society? I may be asked, but to loiter with 
easy grace; surely you would not condemn them all to suckle fools and 
chronicle small beer! No. Women might certainly study the art of healing, 
and be physicians as well as nurses. And midwifery, decency seems to allot 
to them, though I am afraid the word midwife, in our dictionaries, will 
soon give place to accoucheur, and one proof of the former delicacy of the 
sex be effaced from the language.

They might, also, study politics, and settle their benevolence on the 
broadest basis; for the reading of history will scarcely be more useful 
than the perusal of romances, if read as mere biography; if the character 
of the times, the political improvements, arts, &c. be not observed. In 
short, if it be not considered as the history of man; and not of 
particular men, who filled a niche in the temple of fame, and dropped into 
the black rolling stream of time, that silently sweeps all before it, into 
the shapeless void called -- eternity. -- For shape, can it be called, 
'that shape hath none?' 

Business of various kinds, they might likewise pursue, if they were 
educated in a more orderly manner, which might save many from common and 
legal prostitution. Women would not then marry for a support, as men 
accept of places under government, and neglect the implied duties; nor 
would an attempt to earn their own subsistence, a most laudable one! sink 
them almost to the level of those poor abandoned creatures who live by 
prostitution. For are not milliners and mantua-makers reckoned the next 
class? The few employments open to women, so far from being liberal, are 
menial; and when a superiour education enables them to take charge of the 
education of children as governesses, they are not treated like the tutors 
of sons, though even clerical tutors are not always treated in a manner 
calculated to render them respectable in the eyes of their pupils, to say 
nothing of the private comfort of the individual. But as women educated 
like gentlewomen, are never designed for the humiliating situation which 
necessity sometimes forces them to fill; these situations are considered 
in the light of a degradation; and they know little of the human heart, 
who need to be told, that nothing so painfully sharpens the sensibility as 
such a fall in life.

Some of these women might be restrained from marrying by a proper spirit 
of delicacy, and others may not have had it in their power to escape in 
this pitiful way from servitude; is not that government then very 
defective, and very unmindful of the happiness of one half of its members, 
that does not provide for honest, independent women, by encouraging them 
to fill respectable stations? But in order to render their private virtue 
a public benefit, they must have a civil existence in the state, married 
or single; else we shall continually see some worthy woman, whose 
sensibility has been rendered painfully acute by undeserved contempt, 
droop like 'the lily broken down by a plow-share.'

It is a melancholy truth; yet such is the blessed effect of civilization! 
the most respectable women are the most oppressed; and, unless they have 
understandings far superiour to the common run of understandings, taking 
in both sexes, they must, from being treated like contemptible beings, 
become contemptible. How many women thus waste life away the prey of 
discontent, who might have practised as physicians, regulated a farm, 
managed a shop, and stood erect, supported by their own industry, instead 
of hanging their heads surcharged with the dew of sensibility, that 
consumes the beauty to which it at first gave lustre; nay, I doubt whether 
pity and love are so near akin as poets feign, for I have seldom seen much 
compassion excited by the helplessness of females, unless they were fair; 
then, perhaps, pity was the soft handmaid of love, or the harbinger of 
lust.

How much more respectable is the woman who earns her own bread by 
fulfilling any duty, than the most accomplished beauty! -- beauty did I 
say! -- so sensible am I of the beauty of moral loveliness, or the 
harmonious propriety that attunes the passions of a well-regulated mind, 
that I blush at making the comparison; yet I sigh to think how few women 
aim at attaining this respectability by withdrawing from the giddy whirl 
of pleasure, or the indolent calm that stupefies the good sort of women it 
sucks in.

Proud of their weakness, however, they must always be protected, guarded 
from care, and all the rough toils that dignify the mind. -- If this be 
the fiat of fate, if they will make themselves insignificant and 
contemptible, sweetly to waste 'life away' let them not expect to be 
valued when their beauty fades, for it is the fate of the fairest flowers 
to be admired and pulled to pieces by the careless hand that plucked them. 
In how many ways do I wish, from the purest benevolence, to impress this 
truth on my sex; yet I fear that they will not listen to a truth that dear 
bought experience has brought home to many an agitated bosom, nor 
willingly resign the privileges of rank and sex for the privileges of 
humanity, to which those have no claim who do not discharge its duties.

Those writers are particularly useful, in my opinion, who make man feel 
for man, independent of the station he fills, or the drapery of factitious 
sentiments. I then would fain convince reasonable men of the importance of 
some of my remarks, and prevail on them to weigh dispassionately the whole 
tenor of my observations. -- I appeal to their understandings; and, as a 
fellow-creature, claim, in the name of my sex, some interest in their 
hearts. I entreat them to assist to emancipate their companion, to make 
her a help meet for them!

Would men but generously snap our chains, and be content with rational 
fellowship instead of slavish obedience, they would find us more observant 
daughters, more affectionate sisters, more faithful wives, more reasonable 
mothers -- in a word, better citizens. We should then love them with true 
affection, because we should learn to respect ourselves; and the peace of 
mind of a worthy man would not be interrupted by the idle vanity of his 
wife, nor the babes sent to nestle in a strange bosom, having never found 
a home in their mother's.