Serious Hours of a Young Lady

by Charles Sainte-Foi

Your conduct in every detail ought to be discreet and grave in the company of young men with whom you are unacquainted. If they speak to you, answer them briefly modestly and with simplicity, but fearlessly. Let it be your constant endeavor to converse on subjects capable of interesting a serious mind; in this way you can better divert their attention from frivolous topics, and prevent perhaps indiscreet questions or rash intimacies.

It is well to advert to the fact that, in consequence of a deteriorated faith and virtue among young men, in whom a bad education has oftentimes destroyed the happiest dispositions; many among them have lost that esteem, respect and veneration for woman so prevalent in the Christian ages prior to ours. Such, unfortunately, is the case in thousands of instances now-a-days; for when a young man finds himself in company with a young lady his chief object is to amuse himself with her, if his heart, already vitiated, does not entertain desires more criminal still; he is unguarded in his conversation, while displaying his talents, complimenting her for qualities which he interiorly believes her devoid of.

Bear in mind that this young man with whom you are conversing watches all your movements, studies all your looks, discusses and interprets interiorly every word you speak; while treating with you he plays the part of a cunning diplomatist whose wiles you happily ignore; but in order to escape from becoming his dupe, prudence should govern all your actions while in his company.

Remember that there are in the world manners, gestures and attitudes that constitute a conventional language, but which hold nothing in common with the genuine sentiments of the heart, being like a counterfeit money which vanity pays and receives. It is one of the most dangerous snares for a young girl whose simplicity and candor are yet intact. Those qualities, so precious in themselves, are sometimes prejudicial to her safety from the perfidy of a heart already skilful in the art of deceiving. For, judging others by her own heart, she cannot suspect those who converse with her of wicked designs. She accepts all that is told her as the sincere expression of the heart, and very often receives for a genuine affection what is only hypocrisy and deception.

If you are acquainted with the young men whom you meet in the world, you should know how to treat with them; yet experience proves that for the most part a young lady is little posted in matters of this nature. If the mind is already poisoned by the distemper of incredulity, if the heart is already vitiated, if they have justly won by their evil conduct a sad notoriety in the world, if they are of that class that seek to take the advantage of woman's simplicity by rendering vice agreeable to her in their own person; oh, you cannot treat them with too great severity. Your language, your looks, your attitude, should repel them from or command a respectful fear in your presence. Do not fear to wound their feelings, or to be impolite, or indecorous in their regard. An obstinate reserve, a severe demeanor, is all that you owe them. Treating them with that courtesy due to gentlemen would prove noxious to you, as they would not fail to make of it a plausible reason to justify their insolent conduct and rash judgments; be not deceived, the slightest mark of benevolence that they would receive from you would be immediately interpreted by them in the most perfidious manner. They detest virtue as much as you detest vice. They have a sovereign contempt for every woman, for they believe that she is unable to resist the allurements of pleasure.

They are mutual confidentials, and tell each other, with deplorable levity, all that young ladies innocently say to them; wickedly misconstruing their intentions, exaggerating what was true, and treating with sneering contempt those who were simple enough to believe in the sincerity of their hypocritical compliments. Most assuredly you have not the slightest desire of becoming the subject of the scandalous conversation of those men; you have but one means, however, of guarding yourself against their venomous tongue; that is, to exact from them a respectful deference by the gravity of your demeanor, and the severity of your relations with them.

If, on the contrary, you meet with young men who, with a lively faith, have conserved the purity of their hearts, and as a consequence of these virtues, all due respect for woman, you can show them greater confidence, and let them feel that you highly esteem them for their virtues, without, however, renouncing the precautions advised by prudence while in their company. It is in such encounters that your conversation should reveal a serious turn of mind, carefully avoiding every thing that would intimate undue confidence or intimacy; for the heart of a young lady should never be on her lips; except with regard to her mother, she should keep it buried in the depths of her soul to converse familiarly only with God and His angels.

CHAPTER XVII.

CURIOSITY.

CURIOSITY is a defect that seems to be particularly inherent to the heart of woman, and which, when not properly governed, never fails to entail the most disastrous consequences. Through it they have frequently acquired a knowledge of evil and a disgust for virtue. You are well aware that curiosity was the door through which sin and death enter the world; that when the devil sought our destruction he made use of woman's curiosity. Now, it is well not to lose sight of the fact that woman is always the daughter of Eve. She feels a pressing desire to see what pleases the mind, flatters the senses, and enlivens the imagination. Eager for vivid emotions, she seeks them with an insatiable avidity; and, rather than feel nothing, she prefers painful emotions, finding a certain secret charm even in the fits of sorrow and pains of her imagination. Her great desire to see and hear whatever tends to excite or create emotion is in a great measure the source of her curiosity. The education that women for the most part receive develops this disposition of the heart: an education which, instead of elevating the mind and giving it a taste for serious things, narrows it, and accustoms it to feed upon aliments that are trivial and void of consistency. The mind requires to he kept in constant activity, and since thoughts alone can do this they should be such as to amply furnish it with solid and wholesome food, for all kinds of thoughts are not equally good for it, no more than all kinds of food are equally good for the body. In some kinds of food the quantity and quality of nutriment are much inferior to what they are found to be in other kinds. Hence greater moderation is required in the use of the latter than in that of the former, otherwise the stomach, overcharged, would soon become disgusted with it.