From which thou shinest in lofty light of virtue;
Perfected creature by the hand of God,
My spirit's comfort and my heart's delight!"(H. S.)
If during the more ancient epochs there are recorded no Polish women who have made a mark in literary pursuits, this is not due to any intellectual deficit in those otherwise brilliant and gifted representatives of the fair sex, but to prevailing conditions, which did not permit them to turn from the maidenly or housewifely occupations, for
"Woman's virtue never gets along
With novel-reading, sport, and song."
According to the Polish idea, man belongs on the horse, woman to the hearth; in which respect the otherwise antagonistic Germans and Poles do not differ essentially, if we may accept Emperor William's formulated four K's: Kirche (church), Kuche (kitchen), Kinder (children), Kleider (clothing), as typical of German ideals.
Nevertheless, there were not wanting intellectual women who contributed to the brilliancy of the Polish genius during the golden era of their nation's literature. It touches us strangely when the great Polish poet Kochanowski sings in the elegies upon the death of his little daughter Ursula, in 1580:
"Thou, Slavie Sappho, singer young and sweet,
The heiress of my poetry shouldst thou be;