And through the heat of conflict keeps the law
In calmness made, and sees what she foresaw;
Or if an unexpected call succeed,
Come when it will, is equal to the need!
Mrs. Jameson adds that in all these fifty-six lines there is only one line which cannot be feminized in its significance,—that filled up with asterisks, and which is totally at variance with the ideal of a happy woman. It is the line—
And in himself possess his own desire.
No woman could exist happily or virtuously in such complete independence of all external affections as these words express. “Her desire is to her husband:” this is the sort of subjection prophesied for the daughters of Eve. A woman doomed to exist without this earthly rest for her affections does not “in herself possess her own desire;” she turns towards God; and, if she does not make her life a life of worship, she makes it a life of charity, or she dies a spiritual and a moral death. Is it much better with the man who concentrates his aspirations in himself?
THE PRAISE OF WOMEN.
An Old English Ballad.
Both sexes, give ear to my fancy,