It is a question how far a man admires a woman who knows too much. For,
If there is nothing a man can teach a woman, not even of the ways of
love, the man is apt to be chagrined. Besides,
Too much knowledge is inimical to romance.
* * *
War is a man's true trade; love, woman's.
* * *
There is no stronger argument against the equality of the sexes than a
woman's hand. It was made to toil? No; to place in her lover's. In
truth,
Is there anything more fragile in nature than a woman's hand? But put it
in her lover's. and what a force it has!
Anomaly of anomalies, with women, fragility, delicacy, dependence,
beauty, grace,--it is by these weak weapons that she wins. So,
We watch a demure damsel of some sixteen sunny summers much as we watch a
delicate dynamo of some thousand kilowatts.
Both seem so calm, so quiescent. Yet both, we know, can generate such
startling energy, can bring about such marvelous results.
* * *
Many women forget that things which men have no objection to their female
friends doing they often have a very particular objection to their
mothers, sisters, and wives doing. So, too, they often forget that
It is not the girl he flatters, compliments, and is conspicuously
attentive to, that the man always marries. Perhaps this goes to show
that
There is a deeper and more serious current in the flow of male emotions,
which, much as light and fitful breezes may stir the surface, is moved
only by, and mingles only, with a similar and confluent stream. For
It is not man's highest instincts that are stimulated by the more
superficial of feminine blandishments; though, no doubt, many a man there
is has been made permanently captive by their lure. The truth is that
Man is a many-sided creature: he will reflect many different rays; but it
is only under the ray that pierces the surface and irradiates the
interior that he truly glows.
* * *
Woman does not lean upon man because she is inferior, but rather because
she is his supporter; just as
The buttress leans upon the building; but the building would fall without
the buttress. That is,
Woman's dependence upon man is his chief source of strength. Those who
cannot understand this may be left to their ignorance.
* * *
It is not all women who comprehend the exaltation of mind into which some
men are thrown by their presence. Indeed,
Men put a higher value upon a woman's complaisance than she does herself.
To a women, feminine concession appear trivial. Is it any wonder, then,
that
Woman calls man's jealousy unreasonable? In reality,
The affianced man thinks he has gotten him an angel from heaven. It is
not within the bounds of mortal male comprehension that such an angel
should sully her wings.
* * *
Women know their sex.--Which, if it is a truism, is a truism that men
often forget. And
Few things permit a man to see so far into the subtleties and intricacies
of feminine hearts as a squabble between two of them over himself.
* * *
A man in defeat generally turns to woman. A woman in defeat is either
scornful, silent, or both.
A man, in depression, falls back upon his only weapon: brute force. A
woman, in like circumstances, does the same. But her weapon is personal
charm.
* * *
In matters amatory and maternal, a woman will risk more than will a man.
In fact,
In matters amatory and maternal, woman is the truly combative animal.
* * *
Many are the members of the one sex that are entrapped by the wiles of
the other; but it often happens that the entrapper afterwards rues the
capture as much as--or even more than--the entrapped. So, it often
happens that
Girls who are deliberately seeking husbands think love may be won by
artifice. Not until well on in years do
Women know that, by men, love and artifice are considered mortal foes.
To win him a wife by artifice would be to a man a thing impossible and
abhorrent: yet
To win her a husband by artifice is to a woman a thing quite natural.
But
When (if ever) the man discovers that he was won by artifice, there are
apt to be several bad quarters of an hour. For, when all is said and
done,
The man, free and easy, thoughtless and untrammeled, knowing he may pick
and choose, never chooses till--till--there comes the woman he thinks
he wants. Then he says point blank he wants her.
Should it ever be revealed to him that his Want was the result of her
Artifice, a very different complexion is put upon that Want. On the
other hand,
The woman, deprived of the power of choice, trammeled by convention,
bound to wait till asked for, quite naturally resorts to artifice. And
yet, curiously enough, and a thing incomprehensible by man,
A man whom a woman has won by sheer artifice, she can love to the end of
her life. But, after all,
What a refuge, to man, is work--or play! Alas!
Women has no refuge. So,
Men cannot suffer long; women do.
A man flies to work, or sport, or to the gaming-table, or to drink. A
woman . . . . . .
He who can tell what a woman does in the sorrow of the soul, will tell us
much.
Some women, in sorrow of soul, eat out their hearts in silence; other
women, in sorrow of soul, will tell us much.
Some women, in sorrow of soul, eat out their hearts in silence; other
women, in sorrow of soul, eat out the hearts of others, not in silence.
But