OF MODESTY
In Madagascar, a woman exposes without a thought what is here most
carefully hidden, but would die of shame sooner than show her arm.
Clearly three-quarters of modesty come from example. It is perhaps the
one law, daughter of civilisation, which produces only happiness.
People have noticed that birds of prey hide themselves to drink; the
reason being that, obliged to plunge their head in the water, they are
at that moment defenceless. After a consideration of what happens at
Tahiti,[1] I see no other natural basis for modesty.
Love is the miracle of civilisation. There is nothing but a physical
love of the coarsest kind among savage or too barbarian peoples.
And modesty gives love the help of imagination--that is, gives it life.
Modesty is taught little girls very early by their mothers with such
jealous care, that it almost looks like fellow-feeling; in this way
women take measures in good time for the happiness of the lover to come.
There can be nothing worse for a timid, sensitive woman than the
torture of having, in the presence of a man, allowed herself something
for which she thinks she ought to blush; I am convinced that a woman
with a
[Pg 82]
little pride would sooner face a thousand deaths. A slight liberty,
which touches a soft corner in the lover's heart, gives her a moment
of lively pleasure.[2] If he seem to blame it, or simply not to enjoy
it to the utmost, it must leave in the soul an agonising doubt. And
so a woman above the common sort has everything to gain by being very
reserved in her manner. The game is not fair: against the chance of
a little pleasure or the advantage of seeming a little more lovable,
a woman runs the risk of a burning remorse and a sense of shame,
which must make even the lover less dear. An evening gaily passed, in
care-devil thoughtless fashion, is dearly paid for at the price. If a
woman fears she has made this kind of mistake before her lover, he must
become for days together hateful in her sight. Can one wonder at the
force of a habit, when the lightest infractions of it are punished by
such cruel shame?
As for the utility of modesty--she is the mother of love: impossible,
therefore, to doubt her claims. And for the mechanism of the
sentiment--it's simple enough. The soul is busy feeling shame instead
of busy desiring. You deny yourself desires and your desires lead to
actions.
Evidently every woman of feeling and pride--and, these two things being
cause and effect, one can hardly go without the other--must fall into
ways of coldness, which the people whom they disconcert call prudery.
The accusation is all the more specious because of the extreme
difficulty of steering a middle course: a woman has only to have little
judgment and a lot of pride, and very soon she will come to believe
that in modesty one cannot go too far. In this way, an Englishwoman
takes it as an insult, if you pronounce before her the name of certain
garments. An Englishwoman must be very careful, in the country, not to
be seen in the evening
[Pg 83]
leaving the drawing-room with her husband; and, what is still more
serious, she thinks it an outrage to modesty, to show that she
is enjoying herself a little in the presence of anyone _but_ her
husband.[3] It is perhaps due to such studied scrupulousness that the
English, a people of judgment, betray signs of such boredom in their
domestic bliss. Theirs the fault--why so much pride?[4]
To make up for this--and to pass straight from Plymouth to Cadiz and
Seville--I found in Spain that the warmth of climate and passions
caused people to overlook a little the necessary measure of restraint.
The very tender caresses, which I noticed could be given in public, far
from seeming touching, inspired me with feelings quite the reverse:
nothing is more distressing.
We must expect to find incalculable the force of habits, which
insinuate themselves into women under the pretext of modesty. A common
woman, by carrying modesty to extremes, feels she is getting on a level
with a woman of distinction.
Such is the empire of modesty, that a woman of feeling betrays her
sentiments for her lover sooner by deed than by word.
The prettiest, richest and most easy-going woman of Bologna has just
told me, how yesterday evening a fool of a Frenchman, who is here
giving people a strange idea of his nation, thought good to hide under
her bed. Apparently he did not want to waste the long string of absurd
declarations, with which he has been pestering her for a month. But the
great man should have had more presence of mind. He waited all right
till Madame M---- sent away her maid and had got to bed, but he had not
the patience to give the household time to go to sleep. She seized hold
of the bell and had him thrown
[Pg 84]
out ignominiously, in the midst of the jeers and cuffs of five or six
lackeys. "And if he had waited two hours?" I asked her. "I should have
been very badly off. 'Who is to doubt,' he would have said, 'that I am
here by your orders?'"[5]
After leaving this pretty woman's house, I went to see a woman more
worthy of being loved than any I know. Her extremely delicate nature is
something greater, if possible, than her touching beauty. I found her
alone, told the story of Madame M---- and we discussed it. "Listen,"
was what she said; "if the man, who will go as far as that, was lovable
in the eyes of that woman beforehand, he'll have her pardon, and, all
in good time, her love." I own I was dumbfounded by this unexpected
light thrown on the recesses of the human heart. After a short silence
I answered her--"But will a man, who loves, dare go to such violent
extremities?"
There would be far less vagueness in this chapter had a woman written
it. Everything relating to women's haughtiness or pride, to their
habits of modesty and its excesses, to certain delicacies, for the most
part dependent wholly on associations of feelings,[6] which cannot
exist for men, and often delicacies not founded on Nature--all these
things, I say, can only find their way here so far as it is permissible
to write from hearsay.
A woman once said to me, in a moment of philosophical frankness,
something which amounts to this:--
"If ever I sacrificed my liberty, the man whom I should happen to
favour would appreciate still more my
[Pg 85]
affection, by seeing how sparing I had always been of favours--even
of the slightest." It is out of preference for this lover, whom
perhaps she will never meet, that a lovable woman will offer a cold
reception to the man who is speaking to her at the moment. That is the
first exaggeration of modesty; that one can respect. The second comes
from women's pride. The third source of exaggeration is the pride of
husbands.
To my idea, this possibility of love presents itself often to the fancy
of even the most virtuous woman--and why not? Not to love, when given
by Heaven a soul made for love, is to deprive yourself and others of a
great blessing. It is like an orange-tree, which would not flower for
fear of committing a sin. And beyond doubt a soul made for love can
partake fervently of no other bliss. In the would-be pleasures of the
world it finds, already at the second trial, an intolerable emptiness.
Often it fancies that it loves Art and Nature in its grander aspects,
but all they do for it is to hold out hopes of love and magnify it, if
that is possible; until, very soon, it finds out that they speak of a
happiness which it is resolved to forego.
The only thing I see to blame in modesty is that it leads to
untruthfulness, and that is the only point of vantage, which light
women have over women of feeling. A light woman says to you: "As soon,
my friend, as you attract me, I'll tell you and I'll be more delighted
than you; because I have a great respect for you."
The lively satisfaction of Constance's cry after her lover's victory!
"How happy I am, not to have given myself to anyone, all these eight
years that I've been on bad terms with my husband!"
However comical I find the line of thought, this joy seems to me full
of freshness.
Here I absolutely must talk about the sort of regrets, felt by a
certain lady of Seville who had been deserted by her lover. I ought to
remind the reader that, in love.
[Pg 86]
everything is a sign, and, above all, crave the benefit of a little
indulgence for my style.[7]
* * * * *
As a man, I think my eye can distinguish nine points in modesty.
1. Much is staked against little; hence extreme reserve; hence often
affectation. For example, one doesn't laugh at what amuses one the
most. Hence it needs a great deal of judgment to have just the right
amount of modesty.[8] That is why many women have not enough in
intimate gatherings, or, to put it more exactly, do not insist on the
stories told them being sufficiently disguised, and only drop their
veils according to the degree of their intoxication or recklessness.[9]
Could it be an effect of modesty and of the deadly dullness it must
impose on many women, that the majority of them respect nothing in a
man so much as impudence? Or do they take impudence for character?
2. Second law: "My lover will think the more of me for it."
3. Force of habit has its way, even at the moments of greatest passion.
4. To the lover, modesty offers very flattering pleasures; it makes him
feel what laws are broken for his sake.
5. And to women it offers more intoxicating pleasures, which, causing
the fall of a strongly established habit, throw the soul into greater
confusion. The Comte de Valmont finds himself in a pretty woman's
bedroom at
[Pg 87]
midnight. The thing happens every week to him; to her perhaps every
other year. Thus continence and modesty must have pleasures infinitely
more lively in store for women.[10]
6. The drawback of modesty is that it is always leading to falsehood.
7. Excess of modesty, and its severity, discourages gentle and timid
hearts from loving[11]--just those made for giving and feeling the
sweets of love.
8. In sensitive women, who have not had several lovers, modesty is a
bar to ease of manner, and for this reason they are rather apt to let
themselves be led by those friends, who need reproach themselves with
no such failing.[12] They go into each particular case, instead of
falling back blindly on habit. Delicacy and modesty give their actions
a touch of restraint; by being natural they make
[Pg 88]
themselves appear unnatural; but this awkwardness is akin to heavenly
grace.
If familiarity in them sometimes resembles tenderness, it is because
these angelic souls are coquettes without knowing it. They are
disinclined to interrupt their dreams, and, to save themselves the
trouble of speaking and finding something both pleasant and polite to
say to a friend (which would end in being nothing but polite), they
finish by leaning tenderly on his arm.[13]
9. Women only dare be frank by halves; which is the reason why they
very rarely reach the highest, when they become authors, but which also
gives a grace to their shortest note. For them to be frank means going
out without a _fichu_. For a man nothing more frequent than to write
absolutely at the dictate of his imagination, without knowing where he
is going.
_Résumé_
The usual fault is to treat woman as a kind of man, but more generous,
more changeable and with whom, above all, no rivalry is possible. It is
only too easy to forget that there are two new and peculiar laws, which
tyrannise over these unstable beings, in conflict with all the ordinary
impulses of human nature--I mean:--
Feminine pride and modesty, and those often inscrutable habits born of
modesty.
[1] See the Travels of Bougainville, Cook, etc. In some animals, the
female seems to retract at the moment she gives herself. We must expect
from comparative anatomy some of the most important revelations about
ourselves.
[2] Shows one's love in a new way.
[3] See the admirable picture of these tedious manners at the end of
_Corinne_; and Madame de Staël has made a flattering portrait.
[4] The Bible and Aristocracy take a cruel revenge upon people who
believe that duty is everything.
[5] I am advised to suppress this detail--"You take me for a very
doubtful woman, to dare tell such stories in my presence."
[6] Modesty is one of the sources of taste in dress: by such and such
an arrangement, a woman engages herself in a greater or less degree.
This is what makes dress lose its point in old age.
A provincial, who puts up to follow the fashion in Paris, engages
herself in an awkward way, which makes people laugh. A woman coming
to Paris from the provinces ought to begin by dressing as if she were
thirty.
[7] P. 84, note 5.
[8] See the tone of society at Geneva, above all in the "best"
families--use of a Court to correct the tendency towards prudery by
laughing at it--Duclos telling stories to Madame de Rochefort--"Really,
you take us for too virtuous." Nothing in the world is so nauseous as
modesty not sincere.
[9] "Ah, my dear Fronsac, there are twenty bottles of champagne between
the story, that you're beginning to tell us, and our talk at this time
of day."
[10] It is the story of the melancholy temperament and the sanguine.
Consider a virtuous woman (even the mercenary virtue of certain of the
faithful--virtue to be had for a hundredfold reward in Paradise) and
a blasé debauchee of forty. Although the Valmont(13) of the _Liaisons
Dangereuses_ is not as far gone as that, the Présidente de Tourvel(13)
is happier than he all the way through the book: and if the author,
with all his wit, had had still more, that would have been the moral of
his ingenious novel.
[11] Melancholy temperament, which may be called the temperament of
love. I have seen women, the most distinguished and the most made for
love, give the preference, for want of sense, to the prosaic, sanguine
temperament. (Story of Alfred, Grande Chartreuse, 1810.)
I know no thought which incites me more to keep what is called bad
company.
(Here poor Visconti loses himself in the clouds.)
Fundamentally all women are the same so far as concerns the movements
of the heart and passion: the forms the passions take are different.
Consider the difference made by greater fortune, a more cultivated
mind, the habit of higher thoughts, and, above all, (and more's the
pity) a more irritable pride.
Such and such a word irritates a princess, but would not in the very
least shock an Alpine shepherdess. Only, once their anger is up, the
passion works in princess and shepherdess the same). (The Editor's only
note.)
[12] M.'s remark.
[13] Vol. _Guarna_.
[Pg 89]