450 On Learning and the Aris. 
posterity, the inhabitants of modern Europe, un- 
reluctantly bow to. If man have imposed chains 
upon himself, he feels not the weight of them: 
he is happier in the participation of power and 
influence with the female, than when he held her 
under his absolute dominion, when she was the 
slave of his will, or the passive instrument of his 
selfish pleasures. 
This generous sympathy of our northern pro- 
genitors with the partners whom nature and God 
designed for them, happily co-incided with the 
equal and liberal spirit of Christianity ; and to 
these|two powerful agents, which were nearly co- 
temporary, we owe that wonderful revolution of 
social and moral sentiment, which constitutes the 
distinction. of later Europe. Woman_ has 
now been permitted to resume her proper rank 
in society, and to her we are greatly indebted for 
the present polish of ruder man; for that ease, 
propriety, grace, attention and desire to please in 
the manner of every intercourse, which offends 
the cynic eye of Rousseau. To every thing that 
is human‘some accusation may be brought, whe- 
ther in consequence of defect, excess, or associ- 
_ ation,-and: therefore it is not wonderful if polite. 
ness committed to the management of men should 
be subjected to censure; but.‘be her errors and 
excesses what they will, 
Look on her face, and you'll forgive them all! 
