Woman's instinct of purity is specially intolerant towards the unfortunate members of her own sex. She will not hear a word: she is deprived of the power to weigh circumstance, environment, the complicity of others, the wile and treachery of life. The outcast does not even have the benefit of a trial. No court is held in which mercy seasons justice, like one that was long ago extemporized over the woman who knelt on the pavement of the Temple. The men in that crowd were chiefly interested to convict the Master, and not the sinner. If women were present, as is quite probable, they composed a jury that was adverse to the ruling of the court, unless they fell into sympathy from pique at the mock chastity of the men.
In the first scene of the "Midsummer Night's Dream," Hermia and Lysander are in love with each other. Demetrius, who was once deep in love for Helena, has transferred his midsummer inclination to this Hermia, leaving Helena as deep in love with him as ever, but finding Hermia full of disdain. Now Hermia's father would have her marry Demetrius; so she and Lysander, to escape from this paternal preference, agree to meet at night, and fly together from Athens to a darling old aunt who lived at some Hellenic Gretna Green. At this point, Helena enters, who loves Demetrius as much as he now dislikes her. The lovers confide to her their purpose of flight; and Hermia, for comfort, says that she will soon be beyond the reach of Demetrius. Then Helena is left alone to her reflections, during which she says,—
"For ere Demetrius look'd on Hermia's eyne,
He hail'd down oaths that he was only mine;
And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
So he dissolv'd, and showers of oaths did melt.
I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight:
Then to the wood will he to-morrow night
Pursue her: and for this intelligence
If I have thanks, it is a dear expense:
But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
To have his sight thither and back again."
Coleridge frames, in a criticism upon this passage, a sweeping indictment of the feminine disposition. Starting with a misconception of the text, he appends to it a statement that does not seem to me accordant with the facts.
He attributes to Helena a "broad determination of ungrateful treachery," and then adds: "The act itself is natural, and the resolve so to act is, I fear, likewise too true a picture of the lax hold which principles have on a woman's heart when opposed to, or even separated from, passion and inclination. For women are less hypocrites to their own minds than men are, because, in general, they feel less proportionate abhorrence of moral evil in and for itself, and more of its outward consequences, as detection and loss of character, than men,—their natures being almost wholly extroitive."[10]
Now there is no treachery in the act of Helena, because there is no damage in it to the runaways. If she supposed that Demetrius could prevent the flight or prevail over Hermia's repugnance, she would never have given the information to him. Her motive is entirely distinct from treachery, and is rooted in a truly feminine hope of disgusting Demetrius by showing the woman he loves running away with another man. This may cure his passion, and possibly revive it for herself. But she modestly says that even thanking her would be too great a strain upon him. Still, so far from fancying that Demetrius can detach Hermia from Lysander, she means to "enrich her pain,"—that is, deepen it, by following to witness his despair at her rival's flight, then have him back again. For then, perhaps, his feeling may return to her from the point of appreciating her act which disenchants him. All this we have to put down tediously to rescue Shakspeare's compactness from Coleridge's misrepresentation.
But it gives me an opportunity to suggest that women are less hypocritical to their own minds than men are, not because they feel less proportionate abhorrence of moral evil in and for itself, and more of its outward consequences, but because they have an organic instinct, that is due to difference of sex, to be swayed first by passions and inclinations that are entirely frank and unconventional, and afterwards by motives arising out of abstract principles. Therefore they are natively unconscious of something which men smile at or deplore, as they call it insincerity. In the description of one of his characters, Bulwer says, "That strange faculty in women which we men call dissimulation, and which in them is truthfulness to their own nature, enabled her to carry off the sharpest anguish she had ever experienced by a sudden burst of levity of spirit."
Thackeray shows how this native trait can run to viciousness: "When I say I know women, I mean I know that I don't know them. Every woman I ever knew is a puzzle to me, as, I have no doubt, she is to herself. Say they are not clever? Benighted idiot! She has long ago taken your measure and your friends'. She knows your weaknesses, and ministers to them in a thousand artful ways. She knows your obstinate points, and marches round them with the most curious art and patience, as you will see an ant on a journey turn round an obstacle. Every woman manages her husband: every person who manages another is a hypocrite. Her smiles, her submission, her good humor, for all which we value her,—what are they but admirable duplicity? We expect falseness from her, and order and educate her to be dishonest. Should he upbraid, I'll own that he prevail; say that he frown, I'll answer with a smile: what are these but lies, that we exact from our slaves?—lies, the dexterous performance of which we announce to be the female virtues."
But, if a noble woman would defend her art of complaisance, she might justly borrow the words of Queen Katherine, in that fourth scene of the second act of "Henry VIII.," which is manifestly a portion contributed by Shakspeare:—
"Heaven witness,
I have been to you a true and humble wife,
At all times to your will conformable:
Ever in fear to kindle your dislike,
Yea, subject to your countenance,—glad or sorry,
As I saw it inclined. When was the hour
I ever contradicted your desire,
Or made it not mine too? Or which of your friends
Have I not strove to love, although I knew
He were mine enemy?"