A Woman of the World | Page 9

it is impossible to hope that
she will develop into a self-sacrificing, loving, womanly woman,
whose happiness can be found in a peaceful domestic life. She has seen
your mother sad and despondent, under the yoke of genteel poverty,
and heard her bemoan her lost privileges of wealth and station. This,
added to her natural craving for money and place, renders a wealthy
marriage her only hope of happiness on earth.
Mr. Volney has an enormous fortune. He is, as you say, a senile old
man in his dotage. As you say again, such a marriage is a travesty. But
Elise is incapable of feeling the love which alone renders marriage a
holy institution. She has undesirable qualities which ought not to be
transmitted to children, and she is absolutely devoid of maternal
instincts.
I have heard her say she would consider motherhood the greatest
disaster which could befall her. But she is unfitted for a self-supporting
career, and she wants a home and position.
She has beauty, kind and generous impulses, and a love of playing
Lady Bountiful. It is not so much that she wants to benefit the needy, as
that she likes to place people under obligations and to have them look
up to her as a superior being.
Old Mr. Volney is a miser, and his money is doing no one good. He has
only distant relatives, and by taking Elise for a wife (according to law)
he will wrong no one, and she will make much better use of his fortune
than his heirs would make.

Your mother will be relieved of worry and care. Many worthy poor
people and charities will receive help, and Elise will have her heart's
desire--fine apparel, jewels, a social position, and no one to bother her.
The valet and nurse will look after Mr. Volney, and his simple old heart
will bask in the pride of an old man--the possession of a pretty young
wife.
Had he full use of his mental faculties, and did he long for love and
devotion, I would try and dissuade Elise from the marriage, but solely
on his account, not on hers.
The young man you mention, as your choice of a suitor for the hand of
your sister, might better go up in a balloon to seek for Eutopia than to
expect happiness as her husband. He has a sweet, gentle, loving nature,
a taste for quiet home joys, fondness for children, and he has two
thousand a year, with small prospects of more in the near future.
He should marry a modest, domestic girl, with tastes similar to his own,
and with no overweening ambitions. Elise would simply drive him mad
in a year's time, with her restless discontent, her extravagance, and her
desire for the expensive pleasures of earth. It is useless to reason with
her, or to expect her to model her ideas to suit her circumstances.
Inheritance and twenty-one years of wrong education must be taken
into consideration. What would mean happiness for many women
would mean misery for her. I can imagine no more dreadful destiny
than to be tied to a senile old man by a legal ceremony, even were I
given his millions in payment. But that will mean happiness to Elise.
I think we should let people seek their own ideals of happiness, when
they break no law, and injure no other life by it.
I shall congratulate Elise by this post on having made so fortunate an
alliance. I could not congratulate her were she to marry her young
suitor. I shall congratulate your mother on having nothing to worry
about, regarding the future of Elise.
And I advise you to take a philosophical view of the situation, and to
remember that, in judging the actions of our fellow beings, we must

take their temperaments, characteristics, and environment into
consideration, not our own.
You have made the very common error of thinking, because Elise is a
handsome young girl, that love, and home, and children would mean
happiness to her.
Women vary as greatly as do plants and flowers in their needs. The
horticulturist knows that he cannot treat them all alike, and he studies
their different requirements.
To some he gives moisture and sun, to some shade, and to some dry,
sandy soil. The thistle pushes forth a gorgeous bloom from an arid bed.
It would die in the pond where the lily thrives.
Too much sentiment is wasted in this world and too much effort
expended in trying to make all people happy in some one way.
When I was a little girl, a Sunday-school superintendent presented
every girl in the class with a doll, and each doll was exactly the same.
Most little girls like dolls, but I never played with one,