For the Western Carolinian.
Female Academy........Again.
Messrs. Krider & Bingham: The favorable reception you gave my first communication, has encouraged me to send another, by way of an afterpiece, or as a kind of relish to the former.
I may be supposed, by some, to have fairly volunteered as a champion of the fair sex. Very well—I am disposed to admit it, in a qualified sense: But I disclaim all pretensions of being actuated by such a chivalrous spirit as inspired the gallant King James IT. of Scotland; who, it is said, publicly professed himself to Queen Anne of France: The declaration having reached the Queen's ears, she summoned him to prove himself her true and valorous champion, by taking the field in her defence, against his brother-in-law, Henry VIII. of England. He obeyed the romantic mandate; and the two nations fought and bled, to feed the vanity of a proud woman, and to gratify the caprice of a princely coxcomb. From possessing such a spirit, or rather evil genius of gallantry, I beg to be excused. It perverts all those lovely qualities which excite esteem and affection for woman, and renders her subservient to very iniquitous ends.—The lively imagination of woman resembles a mirror, which reflects everything, but creates nothing: hence the necessity of holding up to the view, when they are young, and susceptible of yielding to the impression of the moment, (which with them is very strong,) patterns of virtue, purity of manners, and constancy of love.—Whatever they ask, or whatever they have an inclination to do, if innocently trifling, let them be indulged in: for it is better to yield small sacrifices, than to brave the fury of a temper that has been vexatiously provoked from its infancy, and thus rendered liable to be exasperated by jealousy, or some other frivilous cause. For with all the tenderness of disposition with which nature has endowed woman, when once she is roused to express the transports of her troubled soul, she joins frenzy to love—which is sometimes impetuous, sometimes tender—which now is softened, and then bursts forth afresh, with redoubled fury. As a lamentable instance of this, I recollect of somewhere reading, that, little more than a century ago, the Marquis D'As-trogas, of Spain, having been captivated by the charms of a beautiful young woman, he lost no convenient opportunity of rendering homage to her: The Marchionness, his wife, hearing of the illicit gallantry of her husband, went secretly to the young woman's lodging, and assassinated her; tore out her heart, carried it home, with her own hands made a ragout of it, and presented the dish to the Marquis. He ate of the precious morsel,—"It is exceedingly good," said he. "No wonder," she answered, "since it was made of the heart of that creature you so much doated on." And, not to "leave a thread whereon to hang a doubt" in his mind as to the truth of what she said, she immediately drew forth from under a napkin the bloody head of the hapless victim, and rolled it on the floor; her eyes sparkling, all the while, with a mixture of pleasure and infernal fury.
If such, then, have been the unhappy effects arising from the ungovernable temper and sensitive spirit of a woman of another century, let us suppose that such a disposition is still inherent in female nature; that, though we have not, in the present age, witnessed such fatal exercises of it, an unenlightened mind in this day needs only sufficient excitement to break forth in all the frantic fury of ancient times. To counteract the consequences of any such unruly inherent principle of human nature, early education is the most potent means. I must, therefore, beg pardon of the Instructresses of the Salisbury Femade Academy, while I suggest to them (for I have too exalted an opinion of their abilities, and of the goodness of their dispositions, to address them in dictatorial language) the magnitude of their charge—that they are acting as pioneers to the rising generation—that, in fact, it is in their power to give our rising female society a decided character..........either unaffectedly amiable and virtuous, or tinged with prudish vanity.
It is almost universally asserted on the one hand, and but seemingly denied on the other, that females possess, and exercise too, the Gift of Gab in a much more bountiful degree than the other sex. It is a peculiar inheritance from their mother Eve: For it is established, on the stubborn authority of a fable of the Jewish doctors, that while our primitive parents were yet in the Garden of Eden, blooming stark fresh in all the simplicity of nature, there fell from Heaven nine baskets of Chit-Chat; that the woman picked up six of them, while the man was clumsily gathering up the other three. This accounts for the great volubility of the ladies. It is supposed that, from this circumstance alone, Eve was enabled to persuade Adam to eat of that forbidden fruit which has entailed such a heavy curse upon all the human species—a sinful nature. Well, then, if women must talk so much, it is of vast moment that their talk should be employed to some useful purpose. Here is another important duty devolving upon Instructors. Let young females be taught to converse, as well as to act, in a pure, unaffected and chaste style: Let them inculcate principles of religion and morality, and they will not only give to the female circle in which they move a polish and refinement of manners—a modest benignity of deportment; but will, also, have an important influence in checking the licentiousness of the other sex. They will shrink from the embrace of the sons of dissipation: they will spurn their approach as they would that of the loathsome reptile which hisses beneath their feet: yea, they will shun the very atmosphere that has been tainted by licentious revelry. Young gentlemen—fellow-associates! Do you wish to be debarred the smiles of the fair? And do you wish to meet, on approaching them, instead of smiles, indignant frowns, and a cold repulse more chilling than the frigid blast of a wintry wind f 0 fly, then, fly from intemperance, as you would fly from a pestilential disease; and no longer let your motto be "wine and women"—the watch-word of the Syren, which charms and allures only to destroy—but let it be "virtue and morality," and resolve rigidly to live up to it, and you cannot fail to taste the sweetest of temporal luxuries, and enjoy a bright prospect of Heaven's choicest blessings. Alfred.
[A pencil-note says this article was written by Philo White.]
—Western Carolinian, July 11, 1820.
(Source: North Carolina Schools and Academies, 1790-1840, By Charles L. Coon 1914)
