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Show THE CHIEF END OF WOMAN. "The chief end of woman," said the Deacon oracularly, "is to glorify man and enjoy him forever." "That it is our chief end to glorify man," said the Deacon's wife, "we are taught from infancy by our fathers, but our husbands very soon teach us that we are not to enjoy him forever, but rather that he is appointed to chastise us for our sins and discover unto us the hidden strength of corruption and deceitfulness of our hearts, that we may be humbled." The Deacon's wife is more than a match for the Deacon any day in the Westminster Confession. "I do not think Deacon, you do Miranda justice," said Jennie. "Indeed, I do not believe a man can do any woman justice. He cannot know how we long for some one to lean upon, some one whom we may love and who will love us, some one to whom we can give ourselves, speaking our full love to him by word and deed without being unwomanly. He cannot know what a prisoner a woman is who is shut up in herself, or how all the best part of her nature is put to a lingering death when she has no lover, and no one, therefore to whom she can pour forth love and on whom she can lavish love. So he always makes fun of our school girl attachment, and our fondness for novels and poetry, and our ill concealed want of lovers and beaus, and our poor endeavors to make ourselves attractive without seeming to do so." "Those are my sentiments, exactly," said the Deacon's wife, "only you express them and I could not. Listen to her, Deacon, it is true as Gospel." But the Deacon needed no exhortation, he was listening. "Of one thing you may be sure," continued Jennie, "society is full of Mirandas, though not many of them are as frank as this one. There is only one counsel to give to her, and I wish some one might do it." Whereat I caught up a bit of paper from the table and proceeded to take down a note of the counsel. "If Miranda wants to be admired and loved, let her do something worthy of admiration, and be something worthy of love. Let her forget herself. Let her forget beaux and lovers. Let her cease to dread living single. Let her remember that an unhappy marriage is death on the rack. Let her cease to study how to attract, and begin to study how to serve. Let her do good and be good; sacrifice herself; live for others; be helpful, in her home, her church, her Sunday-school. Let her be willing to lose her life and she will find it. Let her cease to care for admirers and she will be surprised to find admirers beginning to care for her."-Christian Union. |