Essays of Schopenhauer by Arthur Schopenhauer
page 83 of 236 (35%)
page 83 of 236 (35%)
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Your first tears quench'd by her, and your last sighs
Too often breathed out in a woman's hearing, When men have shrunk from the ignoble care Of watching the last hour of him who led them." Both passages show the right point of view for the appreciation of women. One need only look at a woman's shape to discover that she is not intended for either too much mental or too much physical work. She pays the debt of life not by what she does but by what she suffers--by the pains of child-bearing, care for the child, and by subjection to man, to whom she should be a patient and cheerful companion. The greatest sorrows and joys or great exhibition of strength are not assigned to her; her life should flow more quietly, more gently, and less obtrusively than man's, without her being essentially happier or unhappier. * * * * * Women are directly adapted to act as the nurses and educators of our early childhood, for the simple reason that they themselves are childish, foolish, and short-sighted--in a word, are big children all their lives, something intermediate between the child and the man, who is a man in the strict sense of the word. Consider how a young girl will toy day after day with a child, dance with it and sing to it; and then consider what a man, with the very best intentions in the world, could do in her place. * * * * * |
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