Woman physiologically considered as to mind, morals, marriage, matrimonial slavery, infidelity and divorce / by Alexander Walker.

  • Walker, Alexander, 1779-1852.
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Woman physiologically considered as to mind, morals, marriage, matrimonial slavery, infidelity and divorce / by Alexander Walker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    without, appreciates and judges the powers which she can bring into action to compensate for her weakness ; and these powers are the passions of man. Her mechanics are for her more powerful than ours ; all her levers tend to shake the human heart. All that her sex cannot do of itself, and which is necessary or agreeable to it, it must have the art to make us desire ; it is necessary, then, for her to study profoundly the mind of men, not abstractly the mind of man in general, but the minds of the men who are around her, the minds of the men to whom she is subjected, either by law or by opinion. It is necessary that she learn to penetrate their sentiments by their conversation, actions, looks, and gestures. It is necessary that by her conversation, actions, looks, and gestures, she know how to give them the sentiments which please her, without seeming to think of it. They will philosophize better than she respecting the human heart; but she will read better than they the hearts of men. . . . Presence of mind, penetration, fine observation, are the sciences of women ; ability to avail themselves of these is their talent.” So powerful are these means that Cabanis adds, “Vainly would the art of the world cover individuals and their passions with its uniform veil ; the sagacity of woman easily distinguishes each trait, and each shade. Her continual interest is to observe men and her rivals ; and that practice again gives to this species of instinct a quickness and a certainty which the reasoning of the profoundest philosopher could never attain. Her eye, if we may so express it, hears every word ; her ear sees every