To attain the Perfect Dinner we must attain the Perfect Civilization. The diner must be as free to enjoy his dinner as the cook is to prepare it; and, in like manner, the Perfect Dinner is the concomitant of the Perfect Civilization. Man is civilized when he is well-fed and uncivilized when he is ill-fed. This is a truth which you need not accept upon my unsupported authority; any housewife will tell you as much. If the earth were to be visited by a plague which attacked only those who could cook and carried them off all at one time, I believe that the world would relapse into anarchy in the space of thirty days.
It seems to me that the profession of cooking is not at all incompatible with the study of philosophy. As I apply my philosophy to my cooking, so I apply my cooking to my philosophy. Some of my philosophers I take raw, some I boil down to the very juice and some I season; for philosophy, I believe, is often more digestible when taken cum grano salis.
I may be wrong, and it may seem egotistical in me to say it, but really, Mr. Idler, I believe that if more people were of my mind to mix their philosophy and their cooking, there would be many more intelligent cooks and not a few more palatable philosophers.
I am, Sir, your humble servant,
Bartholomew Battercake.
A BACHELOR ON WOMEN
To the Editor of The Idler.
Dear Sir: I have lately been the subject of many animadversions upon the part of literary critics because of a novel of mine, recently published, which these critics have been pleased to term “a study in feminine psychology.” My story has been criticized severely and my observations upon the female character mercilessly condemned, and in every one of these adverse criticisms which has been brought to my attention, the reviewer has taken occasion to say, in substance, “This book was evidently written by a bachelor.”
Now, the fact of my bachelorhood I have no wish to deny, nor could I if I would, for it is well known to my many friends and acquaintances that I am a single man. But is the fact that I am a bachelor conclusive, or even prima facie, evidence of my incompetency to discourse upon feminine psychology? I do not see why it should be so considered. It is plain that a great many people are of the opinion that the man who has married a woman must know more of women in general than the man who has not. But, after all is said, Mr. Idler, why should the married man know more of women than the bachelor knows? He is married only to one woman—not to all womankind.
No man becomes an expert entomologist through the study of one insect. There is no one insect which can furnish him with a general knowledge of entomology. Nor is there any one woman who can furnish us with a general knowledge of women. There is no one woman so typical of her sex that all other women may be judged by her. Yet the only advantage which the married man enjoys over the unmarried man is his intimate knowledge of one particular woman. The married man has not the same liberty of observing women which is the perquisite of the bachelor. The only time when a married man has an opportunity to observe women other than his wife is when his wife is not with him, and then, for a short time, he possesses the same degree of liberty which the bachelor enjoys all of the time. The bachelor observes, not one woman, but many. It is true that his knowledge of women differs from that of the married man in one particular: if he has any intimate knowledge of woman at her worst it is likely to be a knowledge of Judy O’Grady, rather than of the colonel’s lady. The bachelor sees good women at their best and bad women at their worst. The married man sees one good woman at her best and at her worst.