"The fountains of my hidden life
Are through thy friendship fair."
No word in our language has a nobler meaning than "friendship;" it is a pity that none is more often abused. Every hasty intimacy1 formed by force of circumstances—often merely by force of living next door—is dignified3 with the title; but a deeper bond is needed to make a real friendship. "By true friendship," says Jeremy Taylor, "I mean the greatest love, and the greatest usefulness, and the most open communication, and the noblest suffering, and the most exemplary faithfulness, and the severest truth, and the heartiest4 counsel, and the greatest union of minds of which brave men and women are capable."
"Friendship is the perfection of love," says the Proverb, and a certain James Colebrooke and Mary his wife, buried in Chilham churchyard, seem to have been of this mind, for the climax5 of their long epitaph is, that they "lived for forty-seven years in the greatest friendship."
Proverbs on this subject abound6, and teach varied7 lessons: "A faithful friend is the medicine of life;" but it would seem to act differently on different constitutions, for, on the one hand, we are told, "a Father is a Treasure, a Brother is a Comforter, a Friend is both;" on the other, we hear the familiar exclamation8, "Save me from my friends!" which is justified9 by experience from the times of Aristides downwards10, and is endorsed11 by Solomon, when he said, "He that blesseth his friend with a loud voice rising early in the morning, it shall be counted a curse to him;"—words of which the wisdom will be felt by all who know what it is to feel unreasoning prejudice against some unoffending person, solely12 because of the excessive praise of some injudicious friend. Yet none the less are we bound to defend our friends behind their backs and to set them in a fair light. If we cannot aspire13 generally to St. Theresa's title of "Advocate of the Absent," honour demands that we should at least earn it with regard to our friends: though it requires infinite tact14 to avoid making your friend fatiguing15, if not distasteful, to your listener in so doing. For Tact, as well as Honour, is a necessary condition of friendship, in speaking both of, and to, your friend. In this matter of tact, Courtesy covers a large part of the ground.
"We have careful thought for the stranger,
And smiles for the some time guest,
But we grieve our own
With look and tone,
Though we love our own the best."
This applies most to brothers and sisters, but also to friends; it takes the delicate edge from friendship if we think ourselves absolved17 from the minor18 courtesies of manner and speech.
We often say pretty things to an acquaintance, and omit them to a friend, "because she knows us, and we need not be ceremonious." But ceremony is not half such a bad thing as this age seems to think; it may be overdone19, but so may its opposite. Why should we not give our friend the pleasure of this or that acknowledgment of her powers, which a stranger would give her, but which she would value far more from us, even though she "knows we know" it? Saying those things makes the wheels of life's chariot run smoothly,—we think them, why are we so slow to say them? Why should "the privilege of a friend" be synonymous with a cutting remark? Why should we all have reason to feel that "friend" might, without any violation20 of truth, be substituted for the last word in that acute remark on the "fine frankness about unpleasant truths which marks the relative"? Well might Bob Jakes say, "Lor, miss, it's a fine thing to hev' a dumb brute21 fond o' yer! it sticks to yer and makes no jaw22." This question of making no "jaw" is rather a vexed23 one. Most people's experience would lead them to attend to a canny24 Dutch proverb, which observes that a "friend's" faults may be noticed but not blamed: since the consequences of blaming them are mostly unpleasant; but a braver proverb says, "A true friend dares sometimes venture to be offensive;" and we read that it is our duty to "admonish27 a friend; it may be that he hath not said it, and, if he have, that he speak it not again." But this earnest remonstrance28 which is sometimes required of us is very different from the small, nagging29, and somewhat impertinent criticisms which pass so freely between many friends. But defending an absent friend is not the only point of honour essential in true friendship. At the present time the Roman virtues31 seem somewhat at a discount,—they are suspected of a flavour of Paganism; it is more in accordance with the Genius of our Age to show our interest in our friend by talking over his moral and spiritual condition (and par16 parenthèse, all his other affairs) with a sympathizing circle, than to heed32 the old-fashioned idea, "He that is of a faithful spirit concealeth the matter." How often do we hear, "I wouldn't, for the world, tell any one but you, but—;" and then follows a string of repeated confidences which the friend under discussion would writhe33 to hear; yet the speaker would be most indignant at being considered dishonourable, because "it was only said to So-and-so, which is so different from saying it to any one else"! The Son of Sirach made no exception in favour of "So-and-so" when he said, "Rehearse not unto another that which is told unto thee, and thou shall fare never the worse." If it be true of a wife, that "a silent and loving woman is a gift of the Lord," I am sure it is no less so of a friend; in friendship, as in most relations of life, silence, in its season, is a cardinal34 virtue30.
Girls are often tempted35 to retail36 their family affairs to some chosen friend, from a love of confidential37 mysteries; the pleasure of being a martyr38 leads not only to the communication of moving details of home life, but frequently to their invention. A friend of mine adopted a niece, who afterwards married and wrote from India asking her aunt to look through and burn her old letters. My friend found touching39 pictures of home tyranny in the letters from school friends and answers to similar complaints, which the niece had evidently written about her own treatment and since forgotten; possibly the home circles of the other girls would have found the same difficulty that my friend did in recognizing themselves:
"Portrayed40 with sooty garb41 and features swarth."
Equal with Honour, and before Tact, among the conditions of Friendship, I would place Truth, for there can be no union without this for a basis. We have touched already on the truth involved in what is called being "faithful" to a friend, but there are many other kinds required. Passing over the more obvious of these, I would draw attention to the subtler form of untruth, involved in endowing your friend with imaginary gifts and graces.
Yet the more we know of a true friend, the more we find to reverence42 in him, and the more ground for humility43 in ourselves: "Have a quick eye to see" their virtues; nay44, more, idealize those virtues as much as you will, for this is a very different thing from endowing them with those they have not; this is only learning to see with that divine insight essential to the highest truth in friendship. "There is a perfect ideal," says Ruskin, "to be wrought45 out of every human face around us," and so it is with our friends' characters.
And when we have found that ideal and true self, we must be loyal to it—loyal to our friends against their lower selves as well as against their detractors. Plutarch says, "The influence of a true friend is felt in the help that he gives the noble part of nature; nothing that is weak or poor meets with encouragement from him. While the flatterer fans every spark of suspicion, envy, or grudge46, he may be described in the verse of Sophocles as 'sharing the love and not the hatred47 of the person he cares for.'" Such a bit as that makes us forget the centuries which have rolled between us and Plutarch; his temptations are ours—how much easier it is to us to please our friends by sympathizing with their feelings, whether that feeling be right or wrong! How much pleasanter it is to us to gratify our selfish affection by giving them what they want, as Wentworth did King Charles, than to brace48 them to endure hardness for the sake of others!
We are so apt to give and to ask for weakening consolation49. Sympathy in the ordinary use of the term is more weakening than anything, and it is pleasant to give and to take.
But sympathy should be like bracing50 air: "no friendship is worth the name which does not inspire new and stronger views of duty." We all care to be sons of consolation,—let us see to it that we brace others instead of giving mere2 pity. We all like to be pitied, but in our heart we are more grateful to the friend who puts fresh spring into us, by what perhaps seems hard common sense. Those are the friends whose memory comes back to us when circumstances, or years, or distance, have drifted us far apart.
The friend who fed the weaker part of us never gets from us the same genuine affection with real stuff in it. How much easier it is to sympathize with our friends' unreasonable51 vexation—to join in their uncharitable speeches, or in laughing at something we ought not to laugh at, than to brace them
"to welcome each rebuff That turns earth's smoothness rough, each sting that bids nor sit nor stand, but go!"
We find it very hard, almost impossible, to live always up to our own best self, and we may be quite sure our friends do too, whether they talk about it or not, and our duty, as a friend, is to see their best self and help them to be it. Very often the mere fact of knowing that our friend sees our nobler nature, and believes in it, heartens us to keep faith in it and to go on striving after it. "Edward Irving unconsciously elevated every man he talked with into the ideal man he ought to have been; and went about the world making men noble by believing them to be so."
It rests with each of us to draw out the better part in others; we all know people with whom we are at our best, and we have failed in our Duty to our Neighbour if we do not make others feel this with us. "Each soul is in some other's presence quite discrowned;" let the reverse be true where we are.
It is a terrible thought that we have perhaps made others less noble, less pure, less conscientious52, than they would have been. We can never repair the harm we do to one who loses faith in our goodness,—he inevitably53 loses some part of his faith in goodness itself. "Much of our lives is spent in marring our own influence," says George Eliot, "and turning others' belief in us into a widely concluding unbelief, which they call knowledge of the world, but which is really disappointment in you or me."
Nobody, who has not watched or felt it, knows the laming26 of all spiritual energy, the hardening, the blighting54 of all noble impulse which comes from this sort of knowledge of the world; and who can say that he has never (more or less) been thus guilty?—it is more truly blood-guiltiness than anything else, for it helps to murder souls.
Perhaps the greatest of the innumerable blessings55 which friendship confers on the character, lies in this fostering of moral thoughtfulness produced by its responsibilities: "I know not a more serious thing than the responsibility incurred56 by all human affection. Only think of this: whoever loves you is growing like you; neither you nor he can hinder it, save at the cost of alienation57. Oh, if you are grateful for but one creature's love, rise to the height of so pure a blessing—drag them not down by the very embrace with which they cling to you, but through their gentleness ensure their consecration58."[6]
It needs a noble nature to be capable of friendship, or rather a nature which has carefully trained itself by discipline and self-denial, so as to develop all the possibilities of nobleness which were latent in it.
God gives each of us a nature with "pulses of nobleness," and it rests with us whether this shall grow, or be choked by the commonplace part of us. To be noble does not come without trouble. Good things are hard, and "noble growths are slow."[7]
He who would be noble must go through life like Hercules and the old heroes, working hard for others; not troubling about personal comfort and amusement, but practised in going without when he could have,—for the sake of better things.
To be noble means having your impulses under control, and this most especially where your affections are concerned.
Do you want to help others to go right in life? I need not ask, for every generous nature would care to do that, even if she did not care much about her own soul.
Now, you will not do much by direct effort, but you will do an immense deal by conquering your own besetting60 sin. In the "Hallowing of Work," Bishop61 Paget says, "Increased skill and experience and ability are great gifts in working for others, but they do not compare with the power gained by conquering one fault of our own."
Friendship can be the most beautiful thing in the world: it can be the silliest thing in the world. It can be the most lowering: it can be the most ennobling. Nothing excites so much laughter and hard speaking in the world as "schoolgirl friendships;" as often as not they are found among older people, but schoolgirls have given a name to this particular kind of folly62, so it behooves63 schoolgirls to keep clear of it, and to deprive the name of its point.
But can you help being sentimental64 if you are made like that? Some are of good wholesome65 stuff, with an innate66 distaste for everything of the kind, while to some it is their besetting sin.
You can at least take precautions; for instance, do not day-dream about your friend,—brooding over the thought of her weakens your fibre more than being with her.
Make a rule of life for yourself about your intercourse67; walk and talk with her more than with others, but at the same time sandwich those walks and talks by going with other friends,—it is a great pity to narrow your circle of possible friends by being absorbed in one person.
Do not write sentimental letters, and, finally, do not sit in your friend's pocket and say "Darling." (If you wish to know how it sounds, read "A Bad Habit," by Mrs. Ewing.)
I must confess that I believe in what is so often jeered68 at as "kindred souls." Love is not measured by time; often we are truer friends through some half-hour's talk, in which we saw another's real self, than through years of ordinary meeting. But this is so different from the folly I speak of, that I need not dwell on it; except to say that you will be spared many disappointments if you are content with the fact that such moments of sympathy have been, and do not look to have a permanent friendship on that basis. When people draw the veil aside for a minute they generally put it back closer than ever, and do not like to be reminded of the self-revelation.
In the foolish friendships that make so much unhappiness, half the folly lies in expecting the other person to be always at high-water mark, and in being fretful and reproachful when she is not.
But to return to "schoolgirl friendships." When you go out into society you may perhaps want to make private jokes among your friends, or to talk privately70 to them instead of helping71 in general conversation, and you may feel "I have nothing much to contribute to the general stock; why shouldn't I enjoy myself? it's very hard I should be so severely72 criticized for bad manners if I do." But if you look into any such matter, you are sure to find that bad manners are bad Christianity. There is a want of self-restraint in this schoolgirlishness; and you ought not to be able to pick out a pair of great friends in general society, not merely because, if you could, it would show them to be absurd and underbred, but because it would mean that others were made to feel "left out." Have you ever had some violent friendship—or laughed at it in others—which meant running in and out of each other's houses at all hours—being inseparable—quoting your friend, till your brothers exclaimed at her very name—and making all your family feel that they ranked nowhere in comparison with her? In this matter of home and friends conflicting, I quite see the point of view of some: "My family don't give me the sympathy and help that my friend does—they always tease or scold if I come to them in a difficulty, and yet they are vexed and jealous when I find a friend who can and will help."
I do not say, Cut yourself off from your friend,—she is sent by God to help you; but, Remember to feel for your Mother;—see how natural and loving her jealousy73 is, and spare it by constant tact—instead of being a martyr, feel that it is she, and not you, who is ill-used. And in all ways, never let outside affections interfere74 with home ones. It is the great difference between them, that outside, self-chosen affections burn all the stronger for repression75 and self-restraint; while home ones burn stronger for each act of attention to them and expression of them; e.g. postponing76 a visit to a friend for a walk with a brother will make both loves stronger, and vice77 versa,—and your friendship will last all the longer because you consume your own smoke. Dr. Carpenter says that signs of love wear out the feeling;—every now and then they strengthen it, but their frequency shows weakness. Friendships are God-given ties when they are real, but inseparable ones are mostly only follies;—anyhow, family ties are the most God-given of all, and friendship should help us to fulfil family claims better, instead of making us neglect them. The best test of whether your love for an outside person is of the right kind, is, does it make you pleasanter at home? Mr. Lowell mentions an epitaph in the neighbourhood of Boston, which recorded the name and date of a wife and mother, adding simply, "She was so pleasant."
We realize that we ought to make the world better than we find it, but we do not realize how much more we should succeed in doing so if we made it brighter,—a task which is in everybody's power. We are all ready to bear pain for others, but we overlook the little ways in which we might give pleasure. "Always say a kind word if you can," says Helps, "if only that it may come in perhaps with a singular opportuneness78, entering some mournful man's darkened room, like a beautiful firefly, whose happy circumvolutions he cannot but watch, forgetting his many troubles."
And there is one tiny little suggestion I would make to you, so small it will not fit on to any of my larger headings. Do not make fun of your friend's little mishaps79, little stupidities, losing her luggage, having said the wrong thing, or having a black on her face when she especially wished to look well! Your remark may be witty80, but it does not really amuse the victim. I know it is very good for people to be chaffed, and I do not wish them to lose this wholesome bracing. And yet we have a special clinging to some tactful friends who never let us feel foolish.
Another test you should apply to Friendship is, does it lead to idle words? Every one likes talking about their neighbours, and dress, and amusement, but we need to be careful that kindliness81 and nice-mindedness are not sacrificed, and that all our interests are not on that level. Many think that a woman's interest can rise no higher, and many girls and many women give colour to what you and I think a slander82 on us! We all like these things, but we all like higher things too, and we need to encourage the higher part of us because it so soon dies away. You know better than I do how much of your own talk may be silly chatter—or worse—flippant or wrong talk, which you would stop if an older person were by. I have heard High Schools strongly objected to because they made the girls so full of gossip, about what this or that teacher said, or what some girl did, till their people hated the very name of school. If school friends talk much school gossip, they must weaken their minds and feel at a loss when out of their school set. It is very "provincial83" to have no conversation except the small gossip which would bore a stranger, and yet I fear many friends confine themselves to a kind of talk which unfits them for general society. You prohibit "talking shop," by which you sometimes mean subjects which are interesting to all intelligent people, and yet you talk gossiping "shop" about the mere accidents of school life. But, unless you interweave thoughtful interests and sensible topics of conversation with your friendship, it cannot last. There must be the tie of a common higher interest—it may be a common work, or intellectual sympathy, or, best of all, oneness in the highest things—but without this a mere personal fancy will not stand the monotony, much less the rubs and jars, of close intimacy. A friendship, where the personal affection is the deepest feeling, is not a deep love, or of a high kind;—we must in the widest sense love "honour more." "Love is a primary affection in those who love little: a secondary one in those who love much" (Coleridge).
A stool must have three legs if it is to support you, and two friends want a third interest to unite them, or the friendship will die away in unreasonable claims and jealousies84; since "claimativeness" is the evil genius which haunts friendship, unless common sense and wholesome interests are at hand to help. It is difficult, but necessary, to learn that affection is not a matter of will, except in family ties; that our friends love us in exact proportion as we appear to them lovable, that "the less you claim, the more you will have," as the Duke of Wellington said of authority. A very little humility would wonderfully lessen85 our demands upon our friends' affections, and a very little wisdom would preserve us from trying to win them by reproaches. How many coolnesses would be avoided could we learn to see that friendship, like all other relations of life, has more duties than rights. Nothing so certainly kills love as reproaches; I do not believe any affection will stand it. Our hurt feelings may seem to us tenderness and depth of feeling, but they are selfish:—"fine feelings seldom result in fine conduct." If our love were perfectly86 selfless, we should be glad of all pleasure for our friend; failure in his allegiance to us would not change us, nothing would do that except failure in his allegiance to his better self. We should love our friends not for what they are to us, but for what they are in themselves. Of course, it may be said that fickleness87 to us is a flaw in his better self, but if we stop to think how many tiresome88 ways we probably have, we shall be lenient89 to the friends who show consciousness of them.
It is a natural instinct with all of us to claim love; those who seem most richly blessed with it probably have some one from whom they desire more than they receive; every one has to learn, sooner or later, that "an unnavigable ocean washes between all human souls,"—
"We live together years and years,
And leave unsounded still
Each other's depths of hopes and fears,
Each other's depths of ill.
"We live together day by day,
And some chance look or tone
Lights up with instantaneous ray
An inner world unknown."
We all have to learn, sooner or later, that nothing less than Divine Love can satisfy us, but because our natural longings90 are so often denied, some say they are wrong and should be crushed out. It is wrong to give way to them, to yield to the tendency which is so strong with some, to let all their interests be personal,—to care for places and natural beauty and subjects only because they are associated with people,—to let life be dull to us unless our personal affections are in play. Women ought to make it a point of conscience to learn to care for things impersonally91. We are too apt to be like Recha in "Nathan," when she only looked at the palm trees because the Templar was standing92 under them; when her mind recovered its balance, she could see the palm trees themselves.
"Nun93 werd' ich auch die Palmen wieder sehen
Nicht ihn bloss untern Palmen."
If God sends us the trial of loneliness, it may be that He has a special work for us, which needs a long and lonely vigil beside our armour94. He may be depriving us of earthly comfort to draw us closer to Himself, that we may learn from Him to be true Sons of Consolation.
"When God cuts off the shoots of our own interests," it has been well said, "it is that we may graft95 on our hearts the interests of others."
Nothing but knowing what loneliness is can teach us to feel for it in others. Nine-tenths of the world do suffer from it at some time or other; you may not now, but you will some day; and, if you are spared it, nine-tenths of the sorrows of life will be a sealed book to you. "I prayed the Lord," says George Fox, "that he would baptize my heart into a sense of the conditions and needs of all men."
But our Lord, Who Himself suffered under the trial of loneliness, sends all of us friends whom we do not deserve. We can trust to Him to give us the friends we need, just when we need them, and just as long as we need them, as surely as we trust Him for daily bread. He may be keeping His best to the last; nay, the best may never come to us in this life at all; but it is as true now as when St. Anselm said it, eight hundred years ago:—
"In Thee desires which are deferred96 are not diminished, but rather increased; no noble part, though unfulfilled on earth, is suffered to perish in the soul which lives in Thee, but is deepened and hollowed out by suffering and yearning97 and want, that it may become capable of a larger fulfilment hereafter."
The hunger of the heart is as natural, and therefore as much implanted by God, as the hunger of the body. Neither must be gratified unlawfully; but when God sends food to either we should accept it thankfully, without either asceticism98 or greediness, and use the strength it gives us as a means of service. Does not the essence of the wrong sort of love consist in our looking on the affection we receive, or crave99 for, as a self-ending pleasure, instead of as a gift which is only sent to us to make us happier, and stronger to serve others?
We do not need to be always self-questioning as to how far we are using our happiness for others. We do not count our mouthfuls of food, we feed our bodies without thinking of it, and so we should do to our hearts; but we are often not healthy-minded enough to go right unconsciously, though some happy souls there are—
"Glad hearts, without reproach or blot100,
Who do God's work, and know it not."
The Fall brings us under the curse; the tree of knowledge of good and evil has entailed101 upon us the necessity of self-knowledge; and if we find our hearts out of joint102, and craving103 for more love than we get, we should examine ourselves as to whether we use the love we do get, like the runner's torch handed on from one to the other; whether the glow of our happiness warms us to pass on light and heat to others, or whether we absorb it all ourselves.
And if we know that we are selfish in the matter,—what then? We cannot make ourselves unselfish by a wish; we cannot win love at will. But, though we cannot gain love, we can give it; we can learn to love so well, that we are satisfied by the happiness of those we love, even though we have nothing to do with that happiness.
"How hard a thing it is to look into happiness with another man's eyes!" but it can be done. People do sometimes live, "quenching104 their human thirst in others' joys."
Although our craving for sympathy is wrong if it be allowed to lame25 our energies, yet in itself we cannot say it is wrong. "To become saints," says F.W. Robertson, "we must not cease to be men and women. And if there be any part of our nature which is essentially105 human, it is the craving for sympathy. The Perfect One gave sympathy and wanted it. 'Could ye not watch with Me one hour?' 'Will ye also go away?' Found it, surely, even though His brethren believed not on Him; found it in St. John and Martha, and Mary and Lazarus:"—
"David had his Jonathan, and Christ His John."
Some people are quite conscious that they do not "get on" with others; and they are tempted to be morbidly106 irritable107 and exacting108, or else to shut themselves up and say, "It's no use, no one wants me." If no one wants you, it is your fault; for if you were always ready to be unselfish and thoughtful for others in small ways, you would be wanted. You need not fret69 because you are not amusing to talk to, and think that therefore you cannot win affection. As a rule, people do not want you to talk; they want you to listen. Now, any one can be a good listener, for that requires moral, and not intellectual qualifications. Sympathy to guess somebody's favourite subject, and to be really interested in it, will always make that somebody think you pleasant; but the interest must be real: if you only give it for what you can get, you will get nothing.
The right person always is sent just when needed. I do not believe in people missing each other—though it may very well be that we are not fit to be trusted with the affection we should like, and that God knows we should rest in it if we had it, and never turn to Him, and so He keeps it from us till we are ready for it. The longer we live the more we are struck by the apparent chance which threw us with the right people.
There is a Turkish proverb which says, "Every only child has a sister somewhere," and F.D. Maurice, in his beautiful paper on the "Fa?ry Queen," declares his belief that all who are meant to be friends and to help each other will find each other at the right time, just as Spenser's knights109, though wandering in trackless forests, always encountered each other when help was wanted.
And if all this is true of ordinary friendship—if it calls for so much high principle and self-denial and prayer—what of love, "the perfection of friendship"? It is usually either ignored or joked about. The jokes are edged tools always in bad taste and often dangerous, but it is a pity the subject should be ignored. When it becomes a personal question the girl is sure to be too excited or irritable to take advice, so that there is something to be said for that discussion of "love in the abstract," which Sydney Smith overheard at a Scotch110 ball. It is surely better, in forming her standard and opinion on this most important of all points, that a girl should have the help of her mother and older friends. Girls do not go to their mothers as they might, because they wait till they are sore and conscious and resentful. Most girls would rather be married, and quite right too,—in no other state of life will they find such thorough discipline and chastening!—it is the only life which makes a true and perfect woman. But if they wish it, let them not be so untidy, so fidgety, so domineering, that no man in his senses would put up with them! And if she be a "leisured girl" with no duty calling her from home (or very possibly many duties calling her to remain at home), let her think, not twice, but many times, before a wish for independence and Bohemianism (which she translates into "Art") leads her into grooves111 of life where she is very unlikely to meet the sort of man who can give her the home and the surroundings to which she is accustomed. Harriet Byron's despair and ecstasy112 about Sir Charles have passed away, but girls still dream of heroes (not always so heroic as Sir Charles). Their dreams cannot fail to be coloured by the novels they read and the poetry they dwell on; do they always realize the responsibility of keeping good company? Read love-stories, by all means, but let them be noble ones, such as show you, Molly Gibson, Mary Colet, Romola, Di Vernon, Margaret Hale, Shirley, Anne Elliot, The Angel in the House, The Gardener's Daughter, The Miller's Daughter, Sweet Susan Winstanley, and Beatrice. It is impossible to dwell on the mere passionate113 emotion of second-rate novels and sensuous114 poetry, without wiping some possibility of nobleness out of your own life. Every influence which you allow to pass through your mind colours it, but most of all, those which appeal to your feelings. You take pains to strengthen your minds, but you let your feelings come up as wheat or tares115 according to chance; and yet the unruly wills and affections of women need more discipline than their minds.
Perhaps the individual girl feels commonplace and of small account. Why should she restrain her love of fun, her Tomboyism, her tendency to flirtation116? She is no heroine! But, let her be as commonplace as possible, she will represent Woman to the man who is in love with her, as surely as Beatrice represented it to Dante.
Every woman, married or single, alters the opinion of some man about women. Even a careless man judges a girl in a way that she, with her head full of nonsense, probably never dreams of;—he has a standard for her, though he has none for himself.
It is small wonder that chivalrous117 devotion should decrease when women lay so little claim to it. Miss Edgeworth needed to decry118 sentimental and high-flown feelings,—the Miss Edgeworth of to-day would need to uphold romance.
Women may still be "Queens of noble Nature's crowning," but they too often find that crown irksome, and prefer to be hail-fellow-well-met, taking and allowing liberties, which give small encouragement to men to be like Susan Winstanley's lover.
Dante never watched the young man and maiden119 of to-day accosting120 each other, or he would not have said—
"If she salutes121 him, all his being o'er
Flows humbleness122."
I am afraid Dante would now be left "sole sitting by the shores of old Romance," unless indeed he went to some of the seniors, who are supposed to have no feelings left! "If you want to marry a young heart, you must look for it in an old body."
Are you, then, to reject all suggestions of a sensible marriage with any man who is not Prince Perfect? I once read a very sensible little poem which described the heroine waiting year after year for Prince Perfect. He came at last, but unfortunately "he sought perfection too," so nothing came of it! Cromwell's rule in choosing his Ironsides is the safest in choosing a husband: "Give me a man that hath principle—I know where to have him." If he comes to you disguised as one of these somewhat commonplace Ironsides, and recommended by your mother, consider how very much the fairy Prince of your dreams would have to put up with in you, and you will probably find it heavenly, as well as worldly wisdom, to "go down on your knees and thank Heaven fasting for a good man's love." You will tell me that many happy and useful lives are now open to women, and that they need not be dependent on marriage for happiness,—and I shall quite agree with you; you may go on to say that marriage can now be to a woman a mere choice amongst many professions, a mere accident, as it is to a man,—and there I shall totally disagree with you. It is quite possible that Happiness may lie in the narrower, more self-willed work of the single woman, but Blessedness, which is higher and more enduring than happiness, can only be known to the married woman whose whole nature is developed, and fully59 known only to the "Queen of Marriage: a most perfect wife."
Are you, then, to spend your lives making nets, or, following Swift's wise caution, even in making cages, waiting, like Lydia Languish123, for a hero of romance, and beguiling124 the interval125 with reading "The Delicate Distress," and "The Mistakes of the Heart"? Not at all! The best way to prepare for marriage is to prepare yourself to be like Bridget Elia, "an incomparable old maid."
"The soul, that goodness like to this adorns126
Holdeth it not concealed127;
But, from her first espousal to the frame,
Shows it, till death, revealed.
Obedient, sweet, and full of seemly shame,
She, in the primal128 age,
The person decks with beauty; moulding it
Fitly through every part.
In riper manhood, temperate129, firm of heart,
With love replenished130, and with courteous131 praise,
In loyal deeds alone she hath delight.
And, in her elder days,
For prudence132 and just largeness is she known;
Rejoicing with herself,
That wisdom in her staid discourse133 be shown.
Then, in life's fourth division, at the last
She weds134 with God again,
Contemplating135 the end she shall attain136;
And looketh back, and blesseth the time past."—Dante.
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1
intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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heartiest
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| 亲切的( hearty的最高级 )； 热诚的； 健壮的； 精神饱满的 | |
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climax
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| n.顶点；高潮；v.(使)达到顶点 | |
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abound
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| vi.大量存在；(in，with)充满，富于 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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exclamation
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| n.感叹号，惊呼，惊叹词 | |
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justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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downwards
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| adj./adv.向下的（地），下行的（地） | |
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endorsed
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| vt.& vi.endorse的过去式或过去分词形式v.赞同( endorse的过去式和过去分词 )；在（尤指支票的）背面签字；在（文件的）背面写评论；在广告上说本人使用并赞同某产品 | |
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solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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aspire
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| vi.(to，after)渴望，追求，有志于 | |
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tact
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| n.机敏，圆滑，得体 | |
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fatiguing
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| a.使人劳累的 | |
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par
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| n.标准，票面价值，平均数量；adj.票面的，平常的，标准的 | |
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17
absolved
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| 宣告…无罪，赦免…的罪行，宽恕…的罪行( absolve的过去式和过去分词 )； 不受责难，免除责任 [义务] ,开脱（罪责） | |
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18
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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19
overdone
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| v.做得过分( overdo的过去分词 )；太夸张；把…煮得太久；（工作等）过度 | |
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20
violation
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| n.违反(行为)，违背(行为)，侵犯 | |
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21
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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jaw
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| n.颚，颌，说教，流言蜚语；v.喋喋不休，教训 | |
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23
vexed
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| adj.争论不休的；（指问题等）棘手的；争论不休的问题；烦恼的v.使烦恼( vex的过去式和过去分词 )；使苦恼；使生气；详细讨论 | |
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24
canny
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| adj.谨慎的，节俭的 | |
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25
lame
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| adj.跛的，(辩解、论据等)无说服力的 | |
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26
laming
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| 瘸的( lame的现在分词 )； 站不住脚的； 差劲的； 蹩脚的 | |
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admonish
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| v.训戒；警告；劝告 | |
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remonstrance
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| n抗议，抱怨 | |
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29
nagging
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| adj.唠叨的，挑剔的；使人不得安宁的v.不断地挑剔或批评（某人）( nag的现在分词 )；不断地烦扰或伤害（某人）；无休止地抱怨；不断指责 | |
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30
virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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31
virtues
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| 美德( virtue的名词复数 )； 德行； 优点； 长处 | |
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32
heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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33
writhe
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| vt.挣扎，痛苦地扭曲；vi.扭曲，翻腾，受苦；n.翻腾，苦恼 | |
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34
cardinal
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| n.(天主教的)红衣主教；adj.首要的，基本的 | |
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35
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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36
retail
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| v./n.零售；adv.以零售价格 | |
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37
confidential
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| adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的 | |
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38
martyr
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| n.烈士，殉难者；vt.杀害，折磨，牺牲 | |
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39
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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40
portrayed
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| v.画像( portray的过去式和过去分词 )；描述；描绘；描画 | |
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41
garb
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| n.服装，装束 | |
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42
reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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43
humility
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| n.谦逊，谦恭 | |
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44
nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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45
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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46
grudge
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| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
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47
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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48
brace
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| n. 支柱,曲柄,大括号; v. 绷紧,顶住,(为困难或坏事)做准备 | |
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49
consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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50
bracing
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| adj.令人振奋的 | |
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51
unreasonable
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| adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的 | |
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52
conscientious
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| adj.审慎正直的，认真的，本着良心的 | |
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53
inevitably
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| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
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54
blighting
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| 使凋萎( blight的现在分词 )； 使颓丧； 损害； 妨害 | |
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55
blessings
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| n.（上帝的）祝福( blessing的名词复数 )；好事；福分；因祸得福 | |
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56
incurred
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| [医]招致的，遭受的； incur的过去式 | |
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57
alienation
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| n.疏远；离间；异化 | |
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58
consecration
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| n.供献，奉献，献祭仪式 | |
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59
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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60
besetting
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| adj.不断攻击的v.困扰( beset的现在分词 )；不断围攻；镶；嵌 | |
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61
bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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62
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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63
behooves
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| n.利益，好处( behoof的名词复数 )v.适宜( behoove的第三人称单数 ) | |
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64
sentimental
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| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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65
wholesome
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| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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66
innate
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| adj.天生的，固有的，天赋的 | |
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67
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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68
jeered
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| v.嘲笑( jeer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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69
fret
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| v.(使)烦恼；(使)焦急；(使)腐蚀，(使)磨损 | |
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70
privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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71
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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72
severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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73
jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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74
interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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75
repression
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| n.镇压，抑制，抑压 | |
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76
postponing
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| v.延期，推迟( postpone的现在分词 ) | |
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77
vice
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| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
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78
opportuneness
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| n.恰好，适时，及时 | |
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79
mishaps
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| n.轻微的事故，小的意外( mishap的名词复数 ) | |
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80
witty
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| adj.机智的，风趣的 | |
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81
kindliness
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| n.厚道，亲切，友好的行为 | |
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82
slander
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| n./v.诽谤，污蔑 | |
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83
provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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84
jealousies
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| n.妒忌( jealousy的名词复数 )；妒羡 | |
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85
lessen
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| vt.减少，减轻；缩小 | |
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86
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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87
fickleness
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| n.易变；无常；浮躁；变化无常 | |
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88
tiresome
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| adj.令人疲劳的，令人厌倦的 | |
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89
lenient
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| adj.宽大的，仁慈的 | |
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90
longings
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| 渴望，盼望( longing的名词复数 ) | |
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91
impersonally
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| ad.非人称地 | |
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92
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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93
nun
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| n.修女，尼姑 | |
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94
armour
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| （=armor）n.盔甲；装甲部队 | |
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95
graft
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| n.移植，嫁接，艰苦工作，贪污；v.移植，嫁接 | |
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96
deferred
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| adj.延期的，缓召的v.拖延，延缓，推迟( defer的过去式和过去分词 )；服从某人的意愿，遵从 | |
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97
yearning
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| a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的 | |
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98
asceticism
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| n.禁欲主义 | |
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99
crave
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| vt.渴望得到，迫切需要，恳求，请求 | |
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100
blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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101
entailed
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| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
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102
joint
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| adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合 | |
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103
craving
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| n.渴望,热望 | |
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104
quenching
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| 淬火，熄 | |
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105
essentially
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| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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106
morbidly
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| adv.病态地 | |
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107
irritable
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| adj.急躁的；过敏的；易怒的 | |
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108
exacting
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| adj.苛求的，要求严格的 | |
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109
knights
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| 骑士； （中古时代的）武士( knight的名词复数 )； 骑士； 爵士； （国际象棋中）马 | |
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110
scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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111
grooves
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| n.沟( groove的名词复数 )；槽；老一套；（某种）音乐节奏v.沟( groove的第三人称单数 )；槽；老一套；（某种）音乐节奏 | |
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112
ecstasy
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| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
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113
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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sensuous
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| adj.激发美感的；感官的，感觉上的 | |
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115
tares
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| 荑；稂莠；稗 | |
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116
flirtation
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| n.调情，调戏，挑逗 | |
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117
chivalrous
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| adj.武士精神的；对女人彬彬有礼的 | |
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118
decry
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| v.危难，谴责 | |
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119
maiden
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| n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的 | |
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120
accosting
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| v.走过去跟…讲话( accost的现在分词 )；跟…搭讪；（乞丐等）上前向…乞讨；（妓女等）勾搭 | |
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121
salutes
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| n.致敬，欢迎，敬礼( salute的名词复数 )v.欢迎，致敬( salute的第三人称单数 )；赞扬，赞颂 | |
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122
humbleness
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| n.谦卑，谦逊；恭顺 | |
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123
languish
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| vi.变得衰弱无力，失去活力，（植物等）凋萎 | |
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124
beguiling
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| adj.欺骗的，诱人的v.欺骗( beguile的现在分词 )；使陶醉；使高兴；消磨（时间等） | |
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125
interval
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| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
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126
adorns
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| 装饰，佩带( adorn的第三人称单数 ) | |
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127
concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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128
primal
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| adj.原始的；最重要的 | |
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129
temperate
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| adj.温和的，温带的，自我克制的，不过分的 | |
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130
replenished
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| 补充( replenish的过去式和过去分词 )； 重新装满 | |
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131
courteous
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| adj.彬彬有礼的，客气的 | |
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132
prudence
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| n.谨慎，精明，节俭 | |
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133
discourse
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| n.论文，演说；谈话；话语；vi.讲述，著述 | |
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134
weds
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| v.嫁，娶，（与…）结婚( wed的第三人称单数 ) | |
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135
contemplating
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| 深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想 | |
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136
attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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