| Show GIRLS AND MARRIED MEN copyright 1893 by b the rok bok syndicate press vew york however much of a flirt the average american girl may be she confines her field of conquest to the single men I 1 say the average flirt but now and then in country places in lesser cities and in the large metropolis we come upon the exception to the rule and find a girl who is not averse to numbering married men among her admirers even among her victims A good d deal eal of S study t d y and observation OF ot this order of girl has has led ine me to the following conclusions regarding her I 1 the young women who get their names associated unpleasantly unpleasantly with married admirers can be e divided into three classes the spoiled girl who is over sentimental conceited and gushing the utterly selfish and vain girl and the overripe girl I 1 met one of oe tie first type recently in the heart of the great metropolis she was a beauty an only child and motherless and possessed wealth and position she had gorged her naturally romantic mind on french novels and she was utterly spoiled by adulation she loved to talk of herself and she confessed to me that she had at the age of twenty grown quite blasl with t the e monotonous attentions of adoring swains and that she found nothing so interesting now as the ad admiration ammirati on of married men 1 I suppose I 1 like them because they are unattainable she said quite nonchalantly and I 1 confess the nearest sentiment I 1 ever felt to love was inspired by a married man his unhappy domestic life first drew me to him he said he felt I 1 had such a sympathetic nature from the very first poor fellow he is nearly crazy about me now he fairly adores the ground I 1 walk on my dear girl nothing is so uncertain as the impression a coquettish young woman makes on a married than man 1 I 1 I 1 replied quite like likely ly he is telling his is wife that he pities the fool who marries you he may flatter you you and pay you compliments galore and sigh over you just to see how much you know of human nature but he is not respecting you that is certain he may feel the charm of your beauty but he would not defend your good name if he heard it assailed if he is sufficiently lacking in principle to lead you to receive receive his compromising attentions he is lacking the honor to defend you from the tongue of gossip he would defend me because he is in love with me she urged did you never hear of an unhappy married man really feeling the love of a lifetime for some one he met afterward ance in a while that occurs fre I 1 replied glied but you are scarcely t the e type of g girl to inspire such a passion A man would amuse himself with you and try to lea i 1 you on but he would not lose his head over you your position and wealth and beauty would flatter his masculine pride and he would enjoy thinking he had power to lure you over conventions barriers but he would feel a a secret contempt for you all the same wu you are a spoiled sentimental girl wh whose ose imagination has gotten the better of her head and heart you you are wasting sympathy pathy and jeopardizing happiness frothing nothing hing will s so 0 effectually drive away desirable suitors from a young girl as the accepted attentions of a married man the most hopeless coquette is thi the heartless girl with an abnormal love of conquest and excitement who finds with married men the adventure and reckless element necessary to her happiness such a girl is seldom morally vicious in the generally accepted use of that term she is superficial in in her emotions cold vain and selfish she likes her freedom and the opportunities of conquest and adventure it affords her she has no idea of going wrong but loves to play about the brink of danger her only debauch debauchery e r is that of the imagination I 1 having raving no deep emotions of her own to control she tempts and arouses those of men scarcely conscious of her evil influence she flies laughing mocking and more amused than terrified out of dan dangers er rs reach as soon as it menaces her ne she enjoys the tragedy of the situation and has complete control of herself she has a cruel element in her nature and enjoys the power to cause pain she prides herself on being able to make wives ie alous both she and the sentimental girl are div given en to boasting of their conquests and of their ability to attract men from their wives fortunately it is a shallow weak and selfish type of man an only who is bewitched by her men who lack moral balance and who seek constantly folsome new diversion and who regard women as their lawful prey amused teased and momentarily aroused by the elusive coquette they seldom feel a deep passion for her as their natures are too shallow for more than a passing excitement and desire which ends in resentment and anger when she escapes them the world accuses the girl flirt of being far more depraved than she is hers is the depravity of mind without the corresponding depravity of body but the public is slow to believe this she loses he her good name without having committed sin and without having inspired a great love her most persistent pursuers forget her quickly or think of her without regret the third and most to be pitied type of girl whose name is marred by association with a married man is the overripe girl she has lived to pass her twenty I 1 fifth fth birthday without gass having loved or married with more than ordinary ordina mind with a high ideal of cannoo manhood carith with strong emotions and intense ion longing for love she sees her girlhood girlhoods girl hoods s companions mated one by one while her own dreams and hopes slip farther and farther back into the past with her first youth such a girl is liable to be superior to her early admirers and as she he reaches ripe womanhood she finds mental comradeship in married men only then comes the ahe dangerous association with some man whose domestic life is a disappointment and who discovers in her what he misses at home it may be her pastor it may be the family physician it may be the lius husband band of some old schoolmate whom she visits but as a streak of lightning sets fire to dry buildings his hs glance and touch influence her ripened and craving emotions she is capable of feeling andoe and of inspiring agrest a great passion and unlike either of the types already described she he attracts and is attracted by men trong strong in their emotions and of no mean mental endowments men who have grown beyond their wives and who have perhaps lived through years of brain solitude and heart hunger before the they met this girl we speak of a young woman of twenty five or thirty as old enough to be sensible acdwell and well behaved butin but in fact that is the very time of life when it is most difficult for an unanchored woman to be prudent or reasonable from fourteen to seventeen a healthy vigorous girl airl is in danger of imprudence or folly from from ignorance of her emotions from twenty fi five v e to thirty she is in danger from her ger knowledge of them the blind and cruet cruel judgment of christian communities on this subject is inconsistent with the spirit s t of christ or with the scientific enlightenment enlightenment of the present day in other matters when I 1 hear of a girl in that period of life who has wrecked her future and lost her good name through some great act of folly I 1 am moved with the deepest pity and sorrow she is like the dead ripe fruit that bursts in the sun and falls into the dust below it is all very vera well for you with your satisfied lives to sit in judgment and say sa y but she should have spurned the he t first fir st approach she should have been indignant in i at such a thought she should have shown womanly pride and strength it is not so easy to call all those qualities to your aid when with youth auth slip slipping ing behind with loneliness before before wil with a heart breaking for sympathy a brain on fire with feeling and veins bursting with unused vitality you encounter a beautiful and alluring temptation it is so easy to believe at such a time that the world is well jost lost for love that one hour of possession will be worth a lifetime of disgrace but no more fallacious idea ever dazzled the eyes of the soul time has yet to show us the pair of lawless lovers who having given up the world for loves saxe did not resent it if the world took them at their word love is the light from gods eyes unless he smiles approval upon an earthly passion it never brings happiness or content the weak and tortured girl who thinks she cannot endure life without the companionship of a man who is not free to claim her before all the world would find she could not be happy with his companionship one or both w would regret the step which debarred barred de them from the respect of their kind so dear to the human heart love of approbation is very strong in most of us and it is well that it is so I 1 believe more lives have been saved from wreck on the rocks of passion through love of approbation than through principle it may not be the best motive for right doing hut it gives better motives an opportunity to gain the ascendancy later one would think the unhappily married man ought to have strength enough to protect the overripe girl against herself that his wider knowledge of human emotions and temptations should fill him with pity for her but it never does men have not been taught that self con arol is necessary to them in these matters the whole tendency of the world has been toward masculine freedom and self indulgence and it is not to be wondered at that he is the tempter instead of the protector but it does seem a wonder that he invariably blames the woman when he falls such is the fact however and many a passion blendea blinded girl who has believed that the world was well lost for the love of a married man lives to hear him recriminate her for leadin leading h him im astray it is the man who first and most keenly feels the lash of public blame many a case has come under my observation where the husband has returned to his wife who was never able to make him happy leavin leaving the girl who was in in every way endower endowed to be his companion so powerful a factor in hu human man happiness was public respect it is is well for the overripe girl to recall such cases before she yields to the fascinating illusion held out to her by her emotions and her lover nothing else in all the range of human experience is so 0 overpoweringly v alluring as the attraction of the sexes and when the imagination and the senses are both on fire reason lends but little light but alas for those who live to sit by the ashes of the burned out senses among the ruins of imagination and this is an experience certain to follow an unlicensed passion the only hope of continued happiness in the relation of man and woman is in the strength strengthening i and deepening of the moral and spirit spiritual a nature of both for physical attract attraction i n alone is a plant that rarely outlives the season how frail then must be the chances of happiness for the two who violate moral laws to seize the perishing flower of desire only those who have been tempted by its perfume and false splendor and lived to wear the royal rose of a worthy love or those who having plucked it only to see its leaves wither and die leaving the ugly thorns can realize how frail such hopes of happiness are ELLA WHEELER WILCOX or |
