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 exterior graces, and quickly learn to despise

the sensibility that had been excited and hackneyed in the ways of

women, whose trade was vice; and allurement's wanton airs. They

would recollect that the flame, (one must use appropriate

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 of

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 are 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 their

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

infantine 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 background, 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 superior 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. 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 be the force of habit; if such be 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."

CHAPTER 7.

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 more sublime 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 prophesy; 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.*

(*Footnote. "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 every soldier hath his charms;

>From tent to tent she spreads her flame;

For custom conquers fear and shame.")

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

the 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 a-kin 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.*

(*Footnote. Modesty, is the graceful calm virtue of maturity;

bashfulness, the charm of vivacious youth.)

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. 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. 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 relics,

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, and when coquetry and the

lovelorn tales of novelists employ the thoughts. Nay, from

experience, and reason, I should be lead 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 shows 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 gives the tone, peculiar to it, to their behaviour. I mean

even personal respect--the modest respect of humanity, and

fellow-feeling; not 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 on 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;* 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?

(*Footnote. The poor moth fluttering round a candle, burns its

wings.)

But, if the sexes be really to live in a state of warfare, if

nature has pointed it out, let men 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 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 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 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.*

(*Footnote. 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!")

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 brutal

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 indulged 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 hand-maid 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 sits 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 starts of activity which

sensibility produces; but as these flights of feeling 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 landscape, she has invited with placid fervour the

mild reflection of her sister's 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 communion, 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.

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!

(Footnote. 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.)

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.

CHAPTER 8.

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 this 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,

becomes 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, giving 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 acted 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

hissing 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 has 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 smoother

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.*

(*Footnote. I allude to various biographical writings, but

particularly to Boswell's Life of Johnson.)

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 show 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. (Smith.) Because each bystander may have his own

prejudices, besides 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 are 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

shows 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 strides mounts to heaven, and claims kindred with

superiour natures. Virtues, unobserved by men, 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 guage 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.

To satisfy this genius 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 show, 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.

CHAPTER 9.

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 good 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 word, 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 made 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,

vainglorious 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 plough;

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 show

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 show, 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 women 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 women 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 show 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 contrasted 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

converted 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 royality 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, etc. 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 mantuamakers reckoned the next class? The few

employments open to women, so far from being liberal, are menial;

and when a superior 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 or 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 plough share."

It is a melancholy truth; yet such is the blessed effects 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 a-kin 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

stupifies 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 his babes sent to nestle in a strange bosom, having never found

a home in their mother's.

CHAPTER 10.

PARENTAL AFFECTION.

Parental affection is, perhaps, the blindest modification of

perverse self-love; for we have not, like the French two terms

(L'amour propre, L'amour de soi meme) to distinguish the pursuit of

a natural and reasonable desire, from the ignorant calculations of

weakness. Parents often love their children in the most brutal

manner, and sacrifice every relative duty to promote their

advancement in the world. To promote, such is the perversity of

unprincipled prejudices, the future welfare of the very beings

whose present existence they imbitter by the most despotic stretch

of power. Power, in fact, is ever true to its vital principle, for

in every shape it would reign without controul or inquiry. Its

throne is built across a dark abyss, which no eye must dare to

explore, lest the baseless fabric should totter under

investigation. Obedience, unconditional obedience, is the

catch-word of tyrants of every description, and to render

"assurance doubly sure," one kind of despotism supports another.

Tyrants would have cause to tremble if reason were to become the

rule of duty in any of the relations of life, for the light might

spread till perfect day appeared. And when it did appear, how

would men smile at the sight of the bugbears at which they started

during the night of ignorance, or the twilight of timid inquiry.

Parental affection, indeed, in many minds, is but a pretext to

tyrannize where it can be done with impunity, for only good and

wise men are content with the respect that will bear discussion.

Convinced that they have a right to what they insist on, they do

not fear reason, or dread the sifting of subjects that recur to

natural justice: because they firmly believe, that the more

enlightened the human mind becomes, the deeper root will just and

simple principles take. They do not rest in expedients, or grant

that what is metaphysically true can be practically false; but

disdaining the shifts of the moment they calmly wait till time,

sanctioning innovation, silences the hiss of selfishness or envy.

If the power of reflecting on the past, and darting the keen eye of

contemplation into futurity, be the grand privilege of man, it must

be granted that some people enjoy this prerogative in a very

limited degree. Every thing now appears to them wrong; and not

able to distinguish the possible from the monstrous, they fear

where no fear should find a place, running from the light of reason

as if it were a firebrand; yet the limits of the possible have

never been defined to stop the sturdy innovator's hand.

Woman, however, a slave in every situation to prejudice seldom

exerts enlightened maternal affection; for she either neglects her

children, or spoils them by improper indulgence. Besides, the

affection of some women for their children is, as I have before

termed it, frequently very brutish; for it eradicates every spark

of humanity. Justice, truth, every thing is sacrificed by these

Rebekahs, and for the sake of their own children they violate the

most sacred duties, forgetting the common relationship that binds

the whole family on earth together. Yet, reason seems to say, that

they who suffer one duty, or affection to swallow up the rest, have

not sufficient heart or mind to fulfil that one conscientiously.

It then loses the venerable aspect of a duty, and assumes the

fantastic form of a whim.

As the care of children in their infancy is one of the grand duties

annexed to the female character by nature, this duty would afford

many forcible arguments for strengthening the female understanding,

if it were properly considered.

The formation of the mind must be begun very early, and the temper,

in particular, requires the most judicious attention--an attention

which women cannot pay who only love their children because they

are their children, and seek no further for the foundation of their

duty, than in the feelings of the moment. It is this want of

reason in their affections which makes women so often run into

extremes, and either be the most fond, or most careless and

unnatural mothers.

To be a good mother--a woman must have sense, and that independence

of mind which few women possess who are taught to depend entirely

on their husbands. Meek wives are, in general, foolish mothers;

wanting their children to love them best, and take their part, in

secret, against the father, who is held up as a scarecrow. If they

are to be punished, though they have offended the mother, the

father must inflict the punishment; he must be the judge in all

disputes: but I shall more fully discuss this subject when I treat

of private education, I now only mean to insist, that unless the

understanding of woman be enlarged, and her character rendered more

firm, by being allowed to govern her own conduct, she will never

have sufficient sense or command of temper to manage her children

properly. Her parental affection, indeed, scarcely deserves the

name, when it does not lead her to suckle her children, because the

discharge of this duty is equally calculated to inspire maternal

and filial affection; and it is the indispensable duty of men and

women to fulfil the duties which give birth to affections that are

the surest preservatives against vice. Natural affection, as it is

termed, I believe to be a very weak tie, affections must grow out

of the habitual exercise of a mutual sympathy; and what sympathy

does a mother exercise who sends her babe to a nurse, and only

takes it from a nurse to send it to a school?

In the exercise of their natural feelings, providence has furnished

women with a natural substitute for love, when the lover becomes

only a friend and mutual confidence takes place of overstrained

admiration--a child then gently twists the relaxing cord, and a

mutual care produces a new mutual sympathy. But a child, though a

pledge of affection, will not enliven it, if both father and mother

are content to transfer the charge to hirelings; for they who do

their duty by proxy should not murmur if they miss the reward of

duty--parental affection produces filial duty.

CHAPTER 11.

DUTY TO PARENTS.

There seems to be an indolent propensity in man to make

prescription always take place of reason, and to place every duty

on an arbitrary foundation. The rights of kings are deduced in a

direct line from the King of kings; and that of parents from our

first parent.

Why do we thus go back for principles that should always rest on

the same base, and have the same weight to-day that they had a

thousand years ago--and not a jot more? If parents discharge their

duty they have a strong hold and sacred claim on the gratitude of

their children; but few parents are willing to receive the

respectful affection of their offspring on such terms. They demand

blind obedience, because they do not merit a reasonable service:

and to render these demands of weakness and ignorance more binding,

a mysterious sanctity is spread round the most arbitrary principle;

for what other name can be given to the blind duty of obeying

vicious or weak beings, merely because they obeyed a powerful

instinct? The simple definition of the reciprocal duty, which

naturally subsists between parent and child, may be given in a few

words: The parent who pays proper attention to helpless infancy

has a right to require the same attention when the feebleness of

age comes upon him. But to subjugate a rational being to the mere

will of another, after he is of age to answer to society for his

own conduct, is a most cruel and undue stretch of power; and

perhaps as injurious to morality, as those religious systems which

do not allow right and wrong to have any existence, but in the

Divine will.

I never knew a parent who had paid more than common attention to

his children, disregarded (Dr. Johnson makes the same

observation.); on the contrary, the early habit of relying almost

implicitly on the opinion of a respected parent is not easily

shaken, even when matured reason convinces the child that his

father is not the wisest man in the world. This weakness, for a

weakness it is, though the epithet AMIABLE may be tacked to it, a

reasonable man must steel himself against; for the absurd duty, too

often inculcated, of obeying a parent only on account of his being

a parent, shackles the mind, and prepares it for a slavish

submission to any power but reason.

I distinguish between the natural and accidental duty due to

parents.

The parent who sedulously endeavours to form the heart and enlarge

the understanding of his child, has given that dignity to the

discharge of a duty, common to the whole animal world, that only

reason can give. This is the parental affection of humanity, and

leaves instinctive natural affection far behind. Such a parent

acquires all the rights of the most sacred friendship, and his

advice, even when his child is advanced in life, demands serious

consideration.

With respect to marriage, though after one and twenty a parent

seems to have no right to withhold his consent on any account; yet

twenty years of solicitude call for a return, and the son ought, at

least, to promise not to marry for two or three years, should the

object of his choice not entirely meet with the approbation of his

first friend.

But, respect for parents is, generally speaking, a much more

debasing principle; it is only a selfish respect for property. The

father who is blindly obeyed, is obeyed from sheer weakness, or

from motives that degrade the human character.

A great proportion of the misery that wanders, in hideous forms

around the world, is allowed to rise from the negligence of

parents; and still these are the people who are most tenacious of

what they term a natural right, though it be subversive of the

birth right of man, the right of acting according to the direction

of his own reason.

I have already very frequently had occasion to observe, that

vicious or indolent people are always eager to profit by enforcing

arbitrary privileges; and generally in the same proportion as they

neglect the discharge of the duties which alone render the

privileges reasonable. This is at the bottom, a dictate of common

sense, or the instinct of self-defence, peculiar to ignorant

weakness; resembling that instinct, which makes a fish muddy the

water it swims in to elude its enemy, instead of boldly facing it

in the clear stream.

>From the clear stream of argument, indeed, the supporters of

prescription, of every denomination, fly: and taking refuge in the

darkness, which, in the language of sublime poetry, has been

supposed to surround the throne of Omnipotence, they dare to demand

that implicit respect which is only due to His unsearchable ways.

But, let me not be thought presumptuous, the darkness which hides

our God from us, only respects speculative truths-- it never

obscures moral ones, they shine clearly, for God is light, and

never, by the constitution of our nature, requires the discharge of

a duty, the reasonableness of which does not beam on us when we

open our eyes.

The indolent parent of high rank may, it is true, extort a show of

respect from his child, and females on the continent are

particularly subject to the views of their families, who never

think of consulting their inclination, or providing for the comfort

of the poor victims of their pride. The consequence is notorious;

these dutiful daughters become adulteresses, and neglect the

education of their children, from whom they, in their turn, exact

the same kind of obedience.

Females, it is true, in all countries, are too much under the

dominion of their parents; and few parents think of addressing

their children in the following manner, though it is in this

reasonable way that Heaven seems to command the whole human race.

It is your interest to obey me till you can judge for yourself; and

the Almighty Father of all has implanted an affection in me to

serve as a guard to you whilst your reason is unfolding; but when

your mind arrives at maturity, you must only obey me, or rather

respect my opinions, so far as they coincide with the light that is

breaking in on your own mind.

A slavish bondage to parents cramps every faculty of the mind; and

Mr. Locke very judiciously observes, that "if the mind be curbed

and humbled too much in children; if their spirits be abased and

broken much by too strict an hand over them; they lose all their

vigour and industry." This strict hand may, in some degree,

account for the weakness of women; for girls, from various causes,

are more kept down by their parents, in every sense of the word,

than boys. The duty expected from them is, like all the duties

arbitrarily imposed on women, more from a sense of propriety, more

out of respect for decorum, than reason; and thus taught slavishly

to submit to their parents, they are prepared for the slavery of

marriage. I may be told that a number of women are not slaves in

the marriage state. True, but they then become tyrants; for it is

not rational freedom, but a lawless kind of power, resembling the

authority exercised by the favourites of absolute monarchs, which

they obtain by debasing means. I do not, likewise, dream of

insinuating that either boys or girls are always slaves, I only

insist, that when they are obliged to submit to authority blindly,

their faculties are weakened, and their tempers rendered imperious

or abject. I also lament, that parents, indolently availing

themselves of a supposed privilege, damp the first faint glimmering

of reason rendering at the same time the duty, which they are so

anxious to enforce, an empty name; because they will not let it

rest on the only basis on which a duty can rest securely: for,

unless it be founded on knowledge, it cannot gain sufficient

strength to resist the squalls of passion, or the silent sapping of

self-love. But it is not the parents who have given the surest

proof of their affection for their children, (or, to speak more

properly, who by fulfilling their duty, have allowed a natural

parental affection to take root in their hearts, the child of

exercised sympathy and reason, and not the over-weening offspring

of selfish pride,) who most vehemently insist on their children

submitting to their will, merely because it is their will. On the

contrary, the parent who sets a good example, patiently lets that

example work; and it seldom fails to produce its natural

effect--filial respect.

Children cannot be taught too early to submit to reason, the true

definition of that necessity, which Rousseau insisted on, without

defining it; for to submit to reason, is to submit to the nature of

things, and to that God who formed them so, to promote our real

interest.

Why should the minds of children be warped as they just begin to

expand, only to favour the indolence of parents, who insist on a

privilege without being willing to pay the price fixed by nature?

I have before had occasion to observe, that a right always includes

a duty, and I think it may, likewise fairly be inferred, that they

forfeit the right, who do not fulfil the duty.

It is easier, I grant, to command than reason; but it does not

follow from hence, that children cannot comprehend the reason why

they are made to do certain things habitually; for, from a steady

adherence to a few simple principles of conduct flows that salutary

power, which a judicious parent gradually gains over a child's

mind. And this power becomes strong indeed, if tempered by an even

display of affection brought home to the child's heart. For, I

believe, as a general rule, it must be allowed, that the affection

which we inspire always resembles that we cultivate; so that

natural affections, which have been supposed almost distinct from

reason, may be found more nearly connected with judgment than is

commonly allowed. Nay, as another proof of the necessity of

cultivating the female understanding, it is but just to observe,

that the affections seem to have a kind of animal capriciousness

when they merely reside in the heart.

It is the irregular exercise of parental authority that first

injures the mind, and to these irregularities girls are more

subject than boys. The will of those who never allow their will to

be disputed, unless they happen to be in a good humour, when they

relax proportionally, is almost always unreasonable. To elude this

arbitrary authority, girls very early learn the lessons which they

afterwards practise on their husbands; for I have frequently seen a

little sharp-faced miss rule a whole family, excepting that now and

then mamma's anger will burst out of some accidental cloud-- either

her hair was ill-dressed,* or she had lost more money at cards, the

night before, than she was willing to own to her husband; or some

such moral cause of anger.

(*Footnote. I myself heard a little girl once say to a servant,

"My mamma has been scolding me finely this morning, because her

hair was not dressed to please her." Though this remark was pert,

it was just. And what respect could a girl acquire for such a

parent, without doing violence to reason?)