Women in English Life from Mediæval to Modern Times, Volume 2

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R. Bentley & Son, 1896 - Women

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Page 43 - I am not now arguing for an equality of the two sexes. I do not doubt God and nature have thrown us into an inferior rank, we are a lower part of the creation, we owe obedience and submission to the superior sex, and any woman who suffers her vanity and folly to deny this, rebels against the law of the Creator, and indisputable order of nature...
Page 81 - I thank your Ladyship for the information concerning the Methodist preachers ; their doctrines are most repulsive, and strongly tinctured with impertinence and disrespect towards their superiors, in perpetually endeavouring to level all ranks, and do away with all distinctions.
Page 32 - At the last warm debate in the House of Lords, it was unanimously resolved there should be no crowd of unnecessary auditors; consequently the fair sex were excluded, and the gallery destined to the sole use of the House of Commons. Notwithstanding which determination, a tribe of dames resolved to show on this occasion, that neither men nor laws could resist them.
Page 32 - ... privately. After some modest refusals, he swore by G he would not let them in. Her grace, with a noble warmth, answered, by G they would come in in spite of the Chancellor and the whole House. This being reported, the Peers resolved to starve them out; an order was made that the doors should not be opened till they had raised their siege.
Page 96 - But still, you will be an old maid! and that's so dreadful!" "Never mind, Harriet, I shall not be a poor old maid; and it is poverty only which makes celibacy contemptible to a generous public! A single woman, with a very narrow income, must be a ridiculous, disagreeable, old maid! the proper sport of boys and girls; but a single woman, of good fortune, is always respectable, and may be as sensible and pleasant as anybody else.
Page 43 - There is hardly a character in the world more despicable, or more liable to universal ridicule, than that of a learned woman ; those words imply, according to the received sense, a talking, impertinent, vain, and conceited creature.
Page 42 - My sex is usually forbid studies of this nature, and folly reckoned so much our proper sphere we are sooner pardoned any excesses of that than the least pretensions to reading or good sense. We are permitted no books but such as tend to the weakening and effeminating of the mind. Our natural defects are every way indulged, and it is looked upon as in a degree criminal to improve our reason, or fancy we have any. We are taught to place all our art in adorning our outward forms, and permitted without...
Page 33 - Duchesses (very well apprized of the use of stratagems in war) commanded a dead silence of half an hour; and the Chancellor, who thought this a certain proof of their absence, (the Commons also being very impatient to enter,) gave order for the opening of the door; upon which they all rushed in, pushed aside their competitors, and placed themselves in the front rows of the gallery.
Page 139 - ... abandoning compliment on the one hand and false delicacy on the other, submits, that while the tests of astronomical merit should in no case be applied to the works of a woman less severely than to those of a man, the sex of the former should no longer be an obstacle to her receiving any acknowledgment which might be held due to the latter. And your Council therefore recommends this meeting to add to the list of honorary members the names of Miss Caroline Herschel and Mrs. Somerville, of whose...
Page 33 - Commons also being very impatient to enter), gave order for the opening of the door, upon which they all rushed in, pushed aside their competitors and placed themselves in the front rows of the gallery. They stayed there till after eleven, when the House rose ; and...

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