CHAPTER IX
WOMEN AND THEIR WAYS
I sometimes wonder how some women dare go out when it is windy. Their hats are fixed to their hair by means of long pins; their hair is fixed to their heads by means of short ones, and sometimes it happens that their heads are fixed to their shoulders by the most delicate of contrivances. Yes, it is wonderful!
Fiction is full of Kings and Princes marrying shepherdesses and beggar-maids; but in reality it is only the Grand-Ducal House of Tuscany, which for nearly three hundred years has exhibited royal Princesses running away with dancing masters and French masters engaged at their husbands' courts.
A man in love is always interesting. What a pity it is that husbands cannot always be in love!
Men who always praise women do not know them well; men who always speak ill of them do not know them at all.
What particularly flatters the vanity of women is to know that some men love them and dare not tell them so. However, they do not always insist on those men remaining silent for ever.
The saddest spectacle that the world can offer is that of a sweet, sensible, intelligent woman married to a conceited, tyrannical fool.
The mirror is the only friend who is allowed to know the secrets of a woman's imperfections.
When a woman is deeply in love, the capacity of her heart for charity is without limit. If all women were in love there would be no poverty on the face of the earth.
The fidelity of a man to the woman he loves is not a duty, but almost an act of selfishness. It is for his own sake still more than for hers that he should be faithful to her.
Two excellent kinds of wine mixed together may make a very bad drink. An excellent man and a very good woman married together may make an abominable match.
Jealousy, discreet and delicate, is a proof of modesty which should be appreciated by the very woman who should resent violent jealousy.
When you constantly hear the talent or the wit of a woman praised, you may take it for granted that she is not beautiful. If she were, you would hear her beauty praised first of all.
It is slow poison that kills love most surely. Love will survive even infidelity rather than boredom or satiety.
Men study women, and form opinions, generally wrong ones. Women look at men, guess their character, and seldom make mistakes.
All the efforts that an old woman makes to hide her age only help to advertise it louder.
Of a man and a woman, it is the one who is loved, but who does not love, that is the unhappier of the two.
Women often see without looking; men often look without seeing.
I know handsome men who are bald, and there are not a few, but many, who derive distinction from this baldness. There are men – severe, stern types of men – who are not disfigured, but improved, by spectacles. Just imagine, if you can, the possibility of a bald woman with spectacles inspiring a tender passion! So much for the infallibility of the proverb, 'What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander,' so often quoted by women when they are told that men can afford to do this or that, but not they. Lady women-righters, please answer.
In the tender relations between men and women, novelty is a wonderful attraction, and habit a powerful bond; but between the two there is a bottomless precipice into which love often falls, never to be heard of afterward. Happy those who know how to bridge over the chasm!
A woman never forgets, however old she may be, that she was once very beautiful. Why should she? The pity is that she very often forgets that she is so no longer. My pet aversion in society is the woman of sixty who succeeds in making herself look fifty, thinks she is forty, acts as if she were thirty, and dresses as if she were twenty.
I am not prepared to say that celibacy is preferable to marriage; it has, however, this decided advantage over it: a bachelor can always cease to be one the moment he has discovered that he has made a mistake.
Women are extremists in everything. Poets, painters and sculptors know this so well that they have always taken women as models for War, Pestilence, Death, Famine and Justice, Virtue, Glory, Victory, Pity, Charity. On the other hand, virtues and vices, blessings and calamities of a lesser degree are represented by men. Such are Work, Perseverance, Laziness, Avarice, etc.
It is not given to any man or woman to fall in love more than once with the same person. And although men and women may love several times in succession, they can only once love to the fulness of their hearts.
Love does to women what the sun does to flowers: it colours them, embellishes them, makes them look radiant and beautiful; but when it is too ardent it consumes and withers them.
There are two terribly embarrassing moments in the life of a man. The first is when he has to say 'all' to the woman he loves, and the second when all is said.
If a man is not to a certain extent ill at ease in the presence of a woman, you may be quite sure that he does not really love her.
A woman explains the beauty of a woman; a man feels it. A man does not always know why a woman is beautiful; a woman always does.
The sweetest music in the ears of a woman is the sound of the praises of the man whom she loves.
It is a mistake for a married couple to consider that marriage has made them one. To be attractive to each other they should each preserve their personality quite distinct. Marriage is very often dull because man and wife are one, and feel lonely. Most people get bored in their own company.
Happiness in matrimony is sober, serious, based on love, confidence, and friendship. Those who seek in it frivolity, pleasure, noise, and passion condemn themselves to penal servitude.
The great misfortune of mankind is that matrimony is the only vocation for which candidates have had no training; yet it is the one that requires the most careful preparation.
On the part of a husband, violent jealousy is an insult to his wife, but delicate, discreet jealousy is almost a compliment to her, for it proves his lack of self-confidence, and that sometimes he feels he is not good enough for her, not worthy of her.
Most women have the hearts of poets and the minds of diplomatists. What makes a wife so useful to an ambassador is that she adds her own power of intuition to the five senses already possessed by her husband.
Love in matrimony can live only on condition that man and wife remain interesting in each other's eyes. Devotion, fidelity, attention to duty, and all the troop of domestic virtues will not be sufficient to keep love alive.
Beauty is not the mother of Love. On the contrary, it is often love which engenders beauty, gives brilliancy to the eyes, gracefulness to the body, vibration to the voice. Love is the sun that hatches the flowers of the soul. The face which reflects all the inner sentiments of the heart betrays the love of its owner, and is beautiful.
Those who in good faith promise eternal love and those who believe in such promises are dupes – the former of their hearts, the latter of their vanity. Wine well taken care of improves by keeping, but not for ever; it is destined to turn to vinegar sooner or later.
Love is a great healer. The worst characteristic traits of a man and of a woman have been known to be cured by it.
Men and women do not love before they are thirty, men especially. Until then it is little more than rehearsing. Fortunate are those who retain for the play the same company they had engaged for the rehearsal.
CHAPTER X
WOMAN'S MISSION IN THIS WORLD
Naturalists make little difference between women and the other females of the animal kingdom: they declare that the mission of woman is to be a mother. Napoleon I., who was a naturalist, being asked to give a definition of the best woman, answered: 'The one who bears most children.' And as for him man was mere 'cannon flesh,' I am surprised he did not say, 'The one who bears most boys.'
Moralists are kinder to women; they go so far as to grant that woman's mission is twofold: that she is intended to be a wife and a mother; that she is to be the guardian of the hearth, submissive and devoted to man, her lord and master; to look after her household, and be absorbed by her duties toward her husband and children.
No sinecure, this mission of woman, as you see – no joke either; but moralists have no sense of humour – not a particle of it.
No doubt this double rôle of wife and mother is most respectable; it is even sacred; but woman's nature demands something else. To restrict her circle of activity and influence to her family is to misappreciate her many faculties, her aspirations, her feelings, which, like those of men, are entitled to respect; it amounts to not recognising that her mission is not only familial, but social also.
I will not dwell on the part she is called upon to play in the family as wife and mother. We men all know it, whether we are husbands or sons; but we have also to consider what the rôle of woman is in that society of which she is the great civilizing element as well as the greatest ornament.
The most noble part that has been allotted to woman is that of the flower in the vegetable kingdom. This rôle consists in throwing a spell over the world, in making life more refined and poetical – in a word, in spreading fragrance around her and imparting it to all who come in contact with her. A wag once said that but for the women men could have hoped for Paradise. Good! But what about this world? Is not woman the direct or indirect motive for all our actions? Is she not the embodiment of the beautiful, and therefore the mother of Art?
If she is sometimes the cause of a crime, is she not always the cause of the most heroic deeds performed by man? Can we for a moment suppose society without her? Why, without her it would fall into a state of indolence and degradation, even of utter abjection. Would life be worth living without the sweet presence of kind, cheerful, and amiable women?
Ah, my dear sir, make fun of woman in your club as much as you like; crack jokes at her expense to your heart's content; but acknowledge frankly that you are under her power – at least, I hope, under her influence – and that you could no more do without her than without the air which enables you to breathe.
Talk of woman's mission as wife and mother, as naturalists and moralists do, but let all of us artists cry at the top of our voices that woman's mission is to make life beautiful by the cultivation of her own beauty, beauty of body, mind, and heart.
It is the duty of woman to look as beautiful as she can; it is her imperious duty to charm the world by her sweetness and amiability. A woman who neglects this duty is guilty toward her fellow-creatures, even guilty toward her Maker, by not helping the destiny for which she was created. Countries are civilized in proportion to the influence that women have over men in them.
As long as gardens have flowers and the world has beautiful and amiable women, so long will life be worth living.
CHAPTER XI
IS WOMAN INFERIOR TO MAN?
Many, many years ago a great council was held to discuss the question whether women had souls. I forget the conclusion which that learned assembly arrived at; but what is certain is that now most men do believe that women have souls, although a great number of them are still of opinion that woman is a being inferior to man.
They hold that man is the lord of creation, the masterpiece, the last word of the Almighty.
Now, is this really the case? First, God made the earth, then light, after which He created fishes, birds, and animals of all sorts. Then He said: 'I will now create a being far above all the other animals.'
He took some mud; mark well, I say, some mud, and made Adam. In His wisdom He thought that mud was not good enough to make woman out of, and for her creation he took matter which had already been purified by His Divine breath, and He took part of Adam, and out of it made Eve.
Now, surely, my dear fellow-men, you must own that either mud is better stuff than yourself, or you must confess that woman has a nobler origin than you. You can't get out of it.
Please notice the order of creation: Fish, birds, animals, man and woman. If men do not admit that the Creator began by the least and finished with the best, they will have to conclude that lobsters, eels, crocodiles, sharks, owls, vultures, and mere sparrows are beings superior to them.
If men do not recognise the superiority of these animals over them, they will have to come to the conclusion that the work of creation is one of improvement every day.
But man will say, woman is not so strong as we are. True enough; but horses are stronger than men; elephants by trampling on them can make marmalade of them. Stags are swifter than men. Camels can carry a weight of 2,500 lb. on their backs. Birds can fly, and men are only trying machines to help them do it.
Is man more intelligent than woman? Certainly not. Who ate the apple? I know that Eve was the first to be disobedient, but she had an idea, at all events before Adam had one.
Had he even the power of resistance? No. Did he even try to shield woman after the offence was committed? No, he didn't, the coward. He turned against her and accused her of being the cause of the whole evil done. Poor beginning, a poor show, and a sad lesson by which men have profited, and to this day they turn against the woman they have deceived, and often abandon her. Man is still true to his origin.
My dear sirs, the proof that God was satisfied that, in creating woman, He had said the last word of His Divine work, is that He entrusted her with the most noble of missions, that of bearing the future generations, of bringing children to the world, of guiding their first steps, of cultivating their minds and inculcating in them the love of what is good and right. In intending woman to be mother, God proclaimed the superiority of women over the rest of the creation.
CHAPTER XII
WOMEN WHO ARE FOLLOWED AND ANNOYED IN THE STREET
I have constantly heard women complain, in Paris, in London, and in New York, that they can seldom go out in the street without being followed and annoyed by men, many of whom look like gentlemen.
And they express their complaint in tones of indignation not altogether free from a little air of self-satisfaction that seems to say: 'Of course a pretty woman like myself is bound to be noticed and stared at by men.'
Well, I hate to say anything unpleasant to women, but there is an illusion in which they too often indulge, and which I should like to dispel at once.
There are women beautiful as they can be, who can walk in every city perfectly unmolested and in perfect comfort and security, and who would be unable to tell you whether any man or woman had noticed them.
We men are not so bold as many women believe, nor are we so silly. We have instinct, and we know pretty well the woman who enjoys being noticed and looked at, and even the one who seeks that enjoyment for purpose of self-satisfaction or vanity.
I am over fifty years old, and any girl of twenty, I guarantee, will make me feel as timid as she likes in her presence, not by words, but simply by her attitude of dignity and reserve.
And I believe that practically the same might be said of every man who is not an unmitigated scoundrel or blackguard.
In a word, I should like to prove that a woman, who is too often noticed and followed in the street, should be offended by it, and have enough conscience of her value to mention it as little as possible; she should also exercise more control over herself and pay great attention to the way she dresses, looks and walks when out in the street.
For if she is constantly followed, take it for granted that there is in her appearance something, just a little something, that gives a wrong impression of her.
Let women have simplicity in their toilette, dignity in their manner, a severe gracefulness in their general attitude, and I guarantee you that no man – I mean no fairly well-bred man – will ever turn round to look at them.
Women should not call it success. They should feel humiliated to see that some gloriously beautiful women do not obtain it. They should take advice and seek a remedy with the earnestness of that cashier who, returning home, could not even take notice of his wife and children, much less kiss them, until he had discovered the cause of an error of a penny in his accounts amounting to several thousands of pounds.
When a woman tells me that she cannot go out without men looking and smiling at her, I have always a mind to say to her: 'Perhaps you wink at them.'
CHAPTER XIII
DANGEROUS MEN
(A WARNING TO WOMEN)
Among the men who are the most dangerous for women must be reckoned those whose advances of love generally prove unsuccessful. Women have no idea of the harm that may be done to them by those parasites of their homes.
A woman, young, amiable, and cheerful, welcomes such men in her house without entertaining any suspicion. She invites them to her receptions, her dinner-parties; she often finds them pleasant, witty, and then they venture a few flattering compliments. She at first accepts them as the current coin of society, and pays no attention to them.
As she is amiable to her guests, she is not on her guard, and she treats them to the same smiles, which these fops of the purest water often imagine are gracious smiles conferred on them only. Thus encouraged, they go further, and venture compliments bordering on declarations of love, or, at any rate, on expressions of deep admiration. The young woman, used to compliments, takes no notice of our heroes, or pretends to have understood nothing.
Her silence is then taken for a tacit acceptance, and the fops, emboldened, make an open declaration of love. Now, a regular flirt or coquette knows how to encourage or discourage a man with one glance, but a perfectly good woman is taken unaware; she feels embarrassed, and, thus apparently encouraged, these men get bolder and bolder, until the young woman has to show them the door.
Then her troubles begin. These parasites will go to their clubs, and, even in drawing-rooms, say that she is a heartless coquette who encourages men to make love to her just to amuse herself. They abuse her, watch her, and, if one day she should compromise herself in the least, woe to her if the secret should fall into such men's hands! There is no revenge of which they are not capable. A case of this sort was, not long ago, investigated thoroughly, and it turned out that an anonymous letter had been written to the husband of a most charming society woman by a cur whom she had to turn out of her house for offering her a worthless love.
CHAPTER XIV
THE MAN WHO SMILES
There is to be met in society a man who is particularly provoking and supremely objectionable and offensive. He is about forty, very gentlemanly, self-possessed, irreproachably dressed, well informed, interesting talker, with a somewhat patronizing air, and an eternal smile of self-satisfaction on his face.
This man has compromised more women than many a 'devil of a fellow.' If you say before him, 'Mrs. X. is very beautiful, isn't she?' he says nothing, but smiles complacently. So you look at him and add:
'Oh, you know her, then?' He smiles again. 'You don't say so!' you remark. 'I should have thought her a woman above the breath of suspicion.'
He smiles still. You become persuaded that he is, or has been, on the most intimate terms with the lady in question.
Mention before him the name of any woman you like to choose, and if the woman is in the least fashionable, or renowned for her beauty or position, he smiles.
If at a ball he asks a lady to give him the pleasure of her partnership for a waltz or a polka, he leans close toward her, smiling at her in such a strange way that people believe he is telling her words of love, or, worse, that he is granted permission to do so.
If he calls on a lady on her reception day, he has a way to salute her, to kiss her hand, to look at her in a patronizing way that seems to say to the other callers:
'See how ceremonious I am with her before other people, and what a good comedian I am!'
And he smiles, smiles, and smiles.
Women are ill at ease in his presence. They hate him, but as he is content with smiling, and goes no further, what are they to do? They avoid him when they can, his smiles are so compromising.
And they are right. His smiles are more compromising than bonâ fide slander and calumny.
The men hate him, too, but they feel as powerless as the women do. They would like to slap his face, but you cannot say to a man:
'I slap your face because I saw you smile on hearing my wife's name.'
No, that would be too absurd. He knows it, and that is why he goes on smiling. He is safe.
When he hears a bit of gossip on a woman, he immediately takes her defence, but in such a weak manner, and with such a smile on his face all the time, that people immediately come to the conclusion that 'it must be all true.'
What is most provoking is that the man has not a bad reputation. He has never been openly mixed in any intrigue, and even his intimate friends have never heard of any love affair connecting him with any woman. For some people he is an enigma, for others a clever comedian, a maniac, a bore, or a fop.
For men who justly hold that women should be treated with such respect that no act of man should cause anyone to even breathe a light remark on their character, the man who smiles is a cur.