ON FEMALE ACQUIREMENTS. 211 



Somerville, Hemans, Harriet Martineau, &c., &c. ; who are exam- 

 ples of the high degree of cultivation of which the female mind is 

 susceptible; and this too even under the disadvantages I have 

 stated. 



Another objection, and a very silly one, urged against women, is 

 that they have a great propensity to prattle ; since this is almost 

 proverbial let it be granted. Of what does their prattle generally 

 consist ? absurdity, frivolity, or scandal ; I say it fearlessly, though 

 some of my young friends would rate me soundly for the assertion. 

 But why is this? they have little else to talk about; their minds 

 having been kept deficient of that solid and useful acquirement, to 

 prattle about which would be productive not only of benefit to them- 

 selves, but of pleasure to the mind of any educated man. 



Let women be but educated to the same degree as men ; let them 

 have the same facilities of acquiring information ; and I hesitate not 

 to say that they will be found not only fully to appreciate the value 

 of these advantages, but, by combining a well educated mind with 

 feelings the most tender, and affections the most fervent, that nature 

 has emplanted in the breasts of any of the human species, amply to 

 repay the assistance afforded them, by constituting the greatest bles- 

 sing of the life of man. 



To the Bachelor I shall not attempt to say much on the subject 

 of matrimonial felicity; he appears to have taken an extreme case: 

 I cannot imagine that he would readily fix his affection on any indi- 

 vidual of the character he describes. He would deserve to have his 

 apartment u deluged with water," his papers burned, &c., if he could, 

 with his fyes open, unite himself to one who would have so little 

 regard for his interest and comfort as to act in this way : as for the 

 " curtained lectures," at which he hints, the best of wives would but 

 show her candour and regard in telling him of a fault; for I appre- 

 hend he must commit one before subjecting himself to this ordeal. 



Men are generally led, in selecting partners, to associate them- 

 selves with those whose minds are most nearly assimilated to their 

 own ; and when this is the case, I do not readily see any source of 

 subsequent unhappiness. It is well for humanity that there do not 

 exist many persons who, like the Bachelor, imagine that they contain 

 within themselves the grand source of their own happiness, and are 

 incapable of deriving it from others ; this world would then be a 

 cold, unsociable spot ; and would exist a miserable exception to 

 that beautiful harmony and mutual dependence which pervades the 

 remainder of the universe. 



CAROLINE. 



