Single woman

“ And if this be so with men, how much more is it so with women? women the dependant, whose happiness in life so much hangs on marriage, and of whom so many must be condemned to lives of single misery—women the dreamers, the emotional, and for whose ambitions there is no field.
How many tens of thousands there must be that gnaw out their hearts in lives wasted and objectless, despised of men and happier sisters?
Such women are ready to follow any crazed visionary.
It is a necessity of a woman's nature to cling to the companionship of a Man, to lean on the stronger sex. ”

“ Bacon says, "The most ordinary cause of a single life is liberty, especially in certain self-pleasing and humorous minds, which are so sensible of every restraint, as they will go near to think their girdles and garters to be bonds and shackles."
The mental life of a single woman is free and untrammelled by any limits except such as are to her own advantage. Her difficulties in the way of development are only such as are common to all human beings. ”

“ It is selfish to say so, but you are so much better off as a single woman—unless—unless you are very fond of your husband—but you won't be very fond of anybody but me, will you?" ”

“ There are not many stories that hang persistently about the love-making of a single woman. In the case of one or another we may find an episode or two—something dashing, something spirited or striking, something brilliant and exhilarating, or something sad. ”

“ There are twenty-two of us men here and only two women. Under such circumstances, how can we afford to permit any woman to remain single. We used to do it years ago, when the disproportion was not quite so great, and what was the result? ”

“ It is evident, then, that women, even in the “emancipation” of the industrial world, are continuing their immemorial self-sacrifice to the family, and that it is not the married woman alone, but the single woman as well, who makes this sacrifice. ”

“ There is an old-fashioned adjective which describes better than any other this preoccupation with things, which so often prevents a woman's coming to an understanding of the heart of her Business. It is old maidish. It has often been the pathetic fate of single women to live alone. To minister to themselves becomes their occupation. The force of their natures turns to their belongings. If in straitened circumstances they give their souls to spotless floors; if rich, to flawless mahogany and china, to perfect household machinery. ”

“ To do any consecutive work, to avoid the terrible waste of energy, wear and tear upon the health consequent on interrupted mental labour, a single life is almost necessary for a woman. She must refuse all that a man can freely, accept and enjoy; he accepts it not only without risk of having to pay for it too dearly, but with positive gain and impetus to his career. Where the husband derives support and spur to his labour, wholesome relaxation, and the inspiration of affection and happiness—a woman is crushed and annihilated ”

“ No, my dear, because I dare say, on the other hand, many could be told of who fail to do their work in single life, and who fail to get happiness in it as well. Put the one class over against the other, and then consider the many, many women who marry for no other reason than from the fear of living single, it will go far to account for the many unhappy marriages that we see, and far to prove that marriage is the natural and proper expectation of woman, and that in a sense she does fail in life, who falls short of that. ”

“ I too, who am fond of society, fond of companionship, and all that is domestic, and choose solitude only as wholesome medicine; but some destinies are fixed early, others late; and I, who once thought, and still think, marriage, with its social harmony and sweet feelings of dependence, most fitted for a woman's nature, have yet quite made up my mind to remain single. ”

“ Most ladies of this class are graced by a retiring manner, and quiet habits, and a gentle address. These 157traits we all prize in woman. Even in their excess, though they have virtually caused an individual to be single, they still have attendant advantages. They are certainly an ornament to the character, giving new lustre to what we, perhaps with difficulty, discovered beneath them.
Economy is another characteristic of a single woman. It may degenerate to a fault, it is true; but in most of those in this condition it is so restricted, as to be a theme not for censure, but approbation. ”

“ The single woman has an advantage over her married sister in freedom of choice, of self-improvement, and service to others. Says George Eliot of the wife, "A woman's lot is made for her by the love she accepts." The "bachelor girl," on the other hand, has virtually all the liberty of the man whom her name indicates that she emulates.
To the unmarried woman, especially the one who may subsequently marry, education in the broad sense of self-culture and development is of primary importance. ”

“ I do not wish to urge your remaining single; that is a point which every woman must decide for herself, when arrived at years of discretion; but I would have you view a single life with sufficient favour to follow it cheerfully, rather than to sacrifice yourself by becoming the wife of a man whom you cannot sincerely respect. ”

“ With all the resources of clubs, billiard-rooms, saloons, narcotics, and stimulants, single men make but a mock show of satisfaction. At heart every one of them envies his married friends. How much more monotonous and more readily exhausted are the resources of woman's single life! No matter what 'sphere' she is in, no matter in what 'circle' she moves, no matter what 'mission' she invents, it will soon pall on her. Would you see the result? We invoke once more those dry volumes, full of lines and figures, on vital statistics. Stupid as they look, they are full of the strangest stories ”

“ Une fois la fortune et la liberté acquises, que leur représentera le mariage sinon une dépossession, le mari étant le chef de la communanté, et un esclavage, la femme devant obeissance au mari?" If this is true of a single woman in France much more true is it in England. ”

“ The women brought under its influence will have a wider horizon, the range of their sympathies will be enlarged, they will have more dignity and more happiness in their lives than the average woman of the old régime, their intercourse with women will be free from littleness, their manner towards men from ungraceful extremes of reserve or freedom—in a word, we shall see the utmost expansion of which the female nature is capable. ”

“ But we need not fear that we can lose anything by the progress of the soul. The soul may be trusted to the end." [7]
On our own hypothesis, the unmarried woman who is modified in the direction of general activity "has interests and occupations of her own"—"she has an extended sphere of public usefulness." ”

“ Now the great fact of life is womanhood, with all its possibilities and varieties—wifehood and motherhood are incidental parts, which may or may not enter into the life of each woman. Womanhood and wifehood are not co-extensive, but up to this time we have acted as though they were. It is true that there always existed a small class who have led isolated lives in convents, and whose function was religious; but there has never until to-day been found an appreciable number of celibate women who have filled worthily a wide sphere of social and public usefulness. ”

“ I would undoubtedly open to single women every legitimate avenue to an honorable self-support, and thus keep them from many of the pitfalls which so closely environ them, and by causing for the married woman more or greater occasion to respect her husband, I would redouble for him her affection. ”

“ On the contrary, she is, for the most part, singularly content, patient and serene,—more so than many wives who have household duties and domestic cares to tire and trouble them.
5. Remain Single from Necessity.—It is a stupid, as well as a heinous mistake, that women who remain single do so from necessity. Almost any woman can get a husband if she is so minded, as daily observation attests. When we see the multitudes of wives who have no visible signs of matrimonial recommendation, why should we think that old maids have been totally neglected? We may meet those who do not look inviting. ”

“ We hear continually of the difficulty of making up good marriages, and of the monstrous fortunes demanded with brides, and yet no young woman of our quality is permitted to remain single, even if she desire it. ”

“ Although marriage sometimes develops the character in both sexes, in women it may secure this special development at a greater cost of general growth than is justifiable. When we are studying the development of the character for its own sake, and not for the sake of some special end, the nearest approach to a perfect character is reached by cultivating the faculties generally. If the absence of the special experiences of wife and mother are a loss to a woman, the loss may be more than compensated by the general knowledge of the world which her personal liberty places within her reach. ”

“ This objection is based on two assumptions—first that marriage includes the highest love; second that marriage gives a woman complete development. We will deal with the second assumption first. It is granted that when a young woman is kept by her friends in a state of enforced idleness, of strict tyrannical tutelage, is denied all healthy interest in life, all engrossing occupation and mental activity, it is granted that wifehood and motherhood would mean for her an added interest—a certain amount of development. ”

“ It appears to us that the proportion of women who like to enjoy their industrial picnic in solitude is increasing, and, moreover, that it is voluntarily increasing and not as of necessity. It is also very capable of contention that this applies to those of the female sex who are intellectually superior to the average man or woman."
The normal condition of wifehood and motherhood, with the multifarious domestic duties involved, is a serious drawback to industrial, public, or professional life ”

“ Through these masterly psychological sketches, one cannot help but see that the higher the mental development of woman, the less possible it is for her to meet a congenial mate who will see in her, not only sex, but also the human being, the friend, the comrade and strong individuality, who cannot and ought not lose a single trait of her character. ”

“ No matter if truth to the loftiest ideals kept her single, a woman unmarried, from a Garden of Eden point of view and the pronunciamento of the average citizen, was not fulfilling the sole and only end for which he dogmatized women were made—she was not child-bearing.
In this great spinster class, dominated by such a voice, we may physiologically expect to find an excess of the neurotic altruistic type, women sickened and extremists, because their nature was unexpressed, unbalanced, and astray. ”

“ There is no cause for a young woman, in any ordinary circumstances, to fear that she shall be left single. How very few are they, who deserve the attentions of the other sex, and yet never receive any overtures for marriage. Where the means of support are so equally distributed, and where girls are so well trained, as they are usually 165in this country, nearly every young man is married, and of course finds somewhere a companion. ”

“ Will any sensitive person—especially a person of my own sex—please to imagine what I must suffer as a delicate single lady, at having all these family details obtruded on my attention, whether I like it or not, in the major's rasping martial voice and in the shrill answering screams of the women inside? ”

“ If girls only realized what is before them when they marry, few would be brave enough to change their condition. When I picture to myself what I was at home—a petted darling—never allowed to inconvenience myself when it could possibly be avoided; courted in society; free as air and light-hearted as a child; and then think of all that I have endured from the unkindness of strangers, and the—well—the want of sympathy in him for whom I had given up my dear old home and friends—I ask myself why I did not remain single! ”

“ She has no “true Womanhood” that has yet to be sought and found while we leave her alone. We cannot leave her alone. The moment we leave her alone she ceases to be true Woman: where, then, could she go alone to seek and find her “true Womanhood”? ”

“ Now, if a noble, generous girl of eighteen marries, and is unfortunate, because the cruelty of her husband compels separation, in her dreary isolation, would you drive her to a nunnery; and shall she be a nun indeed? Her solitude is nothing less, as, in the present undeveloped condition of woman, it is only through our fathers, brothers, husbands, sons, that we feel the pulsations of the great outer world. ”

“ I said, "to be quite candid, I don't think that the real cause why so many women nowadays remain single is to be found in the theories we've been airing to one another. The fact is, after all, that we're only a bundle of nerves and emotions, and once our affections are involved we are capable of any heroism." ”

“ Numbers of girls educated at girls' schools, and afterward living at home in narrow circumstances, or going into work conducted by and among women, remain single because they pass the age for marriage without sufficient opportunity for meeting men of their own standing, or make unsatisfactory marriages, because they do not choose from knowledge, but accept the only opportunity that offers. ”

“ It will be said that professions and business may be all very well—may indeed be best—for single women, but that sooner or later the great majority marry, and any plan of life which fails to recognise this contingency is unpractical and absurd. ”