necessary or pleasing; therefore she must have a thorough knowledge of man’s mind; not an abstract knowledge of the mind of man in general, but the mind of those men who are about her, the mind of those men who have authority over her, either by law or custom.  She must learn to divine their feelings from speech and action, look and gesture.  By her own speech and action, look and gesture, she must be able to inspire them with the feelings she desires, without seeming to have any such purpose.  The men will have a better philosophy of the human heart, but she will read more accurately in the heart of men.  Woman should discover, so to speak, an experimental morality, man should reduce it to a system.  Woman has more wit, man more genius; woman observes, man reasons; together they provide the clearest light and the profoundest knowledge which is possible to the unaided human mind; in a word, the surest knowledge of self and of others of which the human race is capable.  In this way art may constantly tend to the perfection of the instrument which nature has given us.

The world is woman’s book; if she reads it ill, it is either her own fault or she is blinded by passion.  Yet the genuine mother of a family is no woman of the world, she is almost as much of a recluse as the nun in her convent.  Those who have marriageable daughters should do what is or ought to be done for those who are entering the cloisters:  they should show them the pleasures they forsake before they are allowed to renounce them, lest the deceitful picture of unknown pleasures should creep in to disturb the happiness of their retreat.  In France it is the girls who live in convents and the wives who flaunt in society.  Among the ancients it was quite otherwise; girls enjoyed, as I have said already, many games and public festivals; the married women lived in retirement.  This was a more reasonable custom and more conducive to morality.  A girl may be allowed a certain amount of coquetry, and she may be mainly occupied at amusement.  A wife has other responsibilities at home, and she is no longer on the look-out for a husband; but women would not appreciate the change, and unluckily it is they who set the fashion.  Mothers, let your daughters be your companions.  Give them good sense and an honest heart, and then conceal from them nothing that a pure eye may behold.  Balls, assemblies, sports, the theatre itself; everything which viewed amiss delights imprudent youth may be safely displayed to a healthy mind.  The more they know of these noisy pleasures, the sooner they will cease to desire them.