"Duskolon esti to thremma anthropus."
--Plato
For man, the over-grown boy, life has commonly two, and only two, sides:
work, and play. Happy he who has for a helpmate one who possesses the
faculty of increasing a zeal for the first and of adding a zest to the
second. Wherein, O woman, thou mayest happily find the two-fold secret
of thy life-work. For
Man is a greedy animal: he wants all or nothing. And fortunately for
him,
Women tacitly extol man's greed: they will not be shared any more than
they will share.
There is something canine in the masculine nature: like a dog over a
bone, it snarls at the very approach of a rival.
* * *
It is curious, but it is true, that proud man becomes prouder (and--more
curious still--at the same time humbler) when weak woman gives him
something--a look a smile, a locket, her hair, a kiss, herself.
* * *
The greater a man's faith in himself, the greater his mistress hers in
him. And perhaps, the greater his mistress her faith in a man, the
greater his in himself. For
A woman's faith in a man works wonders.
* * *
A man to whom a woman cannot look up, she cannot love. Yet,
It is marvelous how a woman contrives to find something to look up to in
a man.
* * *
Many men forget the artistic tendency of the feminine temperament, a
tendency which shows itself in many ways--their love of pretty things,
of pretty ways, and of pretty words. From which three alone we may
deduce the rule that
When with the woman he admires and whose admiration he seeks, a man
cannot be too careful of his dress, his speech, and his manners.
* * *
A believer in Woman is a believer in Good. And vice versa, and mutatis
mutandis.
* * *
Man's standard of value of a woman is usually determined by the scale of
his own emotions. That is to say,
The pedestal upon which a man places a woman (a man always puts a woman
upon a pedestal) is a pedestal erected solely by the effect upon himself
of her charms.
* * *
A man may boast himself invincible by men; never by woman.
* * *
The lady-killer is always an object of attraction to ladies, even to
those whom he makes no attempt to slay.
* * *
It may perhaps be a thing as unreasonable as certainly it is
indisputable, that however much wild oats a man may himself sow, he
invariably entertains a very peculiar objection to any woman near or dear
to him entering upon this particular branch of agriculture.
* * *
He is a fool who does not bear himself before his lady-love as a prince
among men.
* * *
Some men are so gallant that they will never be outdone by the woman who
encourages them. But it often leads to strange embarrassments and
entanglements.
* * *
Few things terrify a man more than the knowledge of a woman's ability to
make her emotions--when, if ever, he arrives at it.
* * *
That is a very silly man who thing she can play one woman off against
another. For
In matters of emotional finesse the masculine instance is nowhere: it is
blinded, befogged, befooled at every turn.
Heaven help the man who is dragged into a quarrel between two wrathful
ladies!
* * *
Three things there be--nay, four--which man can never be sure, how a
greatsoever his acumen, his astuteness, or his zeal: a woman; a race
horse; a patent; and the money-market. They defy both faith and fate;
they should be the recreations not the resources of life; and he is a
fool who stakes more than a portion of his substance on any one of them.
* * *
What a paltry thing, after all, is man, man uncomplemented by woman! Left
to himself, he stagnates; linked with a woman, he rises---or sinks. A
gentle touch stimulates him, a confiding heart makes of him a new
creature. Under the rays of feminine sympathy, he expands who else would
remain inert. Fame may allure him, friends encourage him, fortune cause
him a momentary smile, but only woman makes him; and fame, friends,
fortune, all are naught if there be not at his side a sharer of his weal.
A man will strive for fortune, strip himself for friends, scour the earth
for fame; but were there no woman in the world to be won, not one of
these things would he do.
* * *