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Show j Dorothy Dix Says The secret of the fascination preachers have for women j j holds a tip to every young man who is going a-courting. j I By DOROTHY DIX, The World's Highest Paid Woman Writer 5 In delving into the past history oi a renegade clergyman who has Just been uhirocked and deposed from his high place in the church, it wan dl covered that among his other crimes hp had married twelve different rich women in the various congregations ' r he had served and had robbed thr-m of their money and then deserted them. Thus we have another illustration of the fatal fascination that preachora have for women. The "cloth" seems literally to clothe a man in a visible halo that dazzles women's eyes so that ..-' aren't able to see what man ner of man is wearing it. In every church in the land there is always a body of faithful sisters who worship the preacher Instead of the Ixrd, who speak of him with bated breath as If he were supersanct. and who hang on his every word as If he were an inspired oracle, no matteri how dull and stupid he may be. The old ladies-of the congregation mother him and knit waistcoats and mufflers for him. The young women. If the preacher is unmarried, have a sudden access of piety that sends them scurrying to join the choir, and the missionary societies, and the Bible class, and not the least of a clergyman's clergy-man's difficulties is to keep his feet and his head in the mUNt of all the waves of feminine adulation thai bi .11 Ik up around him. and that have dragged; Ib many a weak man down into the sea I 11 1 hureh scandal. Considering that preachers, as a' I class, are neither better looking nor; more intelligent than their fellew men, the secret of their almost hypnotic' power over women has always been a mystery to other men. .Men can't see why wise old women 1 who have had sixty or seventy years of the educating experiences of life, should sit at the fet of a callow young theological fledgling who knows nothing noth-ing of the real problems of humanity. Young men can't understand why a preacher who, sjo far as they can observe, ob-serve, has no points about him that raise him far above the ordinary man, should be able to reach out his hand and piuck the fairest and richest and most desirable maiden in the congregation congre-gation for a wife while they have wooed the same maiden in vain Men are not crazy about preachers. It's the women folks that are And the men don't know why. Yet to a woman the reason is plain, and it holds a valuable tip to men if they v, II rnl take 11 I ndoubtcdly. to a certa in extent, I the fascination that a preacher has for women is due to the reverence they feel for his sacred office. Women are imaginative, and a minister must be singularly material and earthly in looks and speech for a devout woman not to always see him surrounded by the fluttering of angel wings. She pictures him pondering perpetually the great problems that reach out and grasp the eternity, instead of concerning concern-ing his mind with the price of salt codfish or Steel common, and that of itself gives the clergyman a romantic interest to her that the plain grocer or broker can never inspire. But the real secret of the fascination fascina-tion of the preacher for woman is that he is the only man in the world who ever talks to her about her soul, or even pretends an interest in her I k soul, or cared whether she's got a soul at all or not Other men are merely interested in the material woman. To them the vital question is whether she is good looking or ugly, whether she Is fat or has a tall and willowy figure, whether she is a perfect thirty-six thirty-six or a horrid forty-five. I I When a man wants to pay a woman a compliment, he invariably telle her how good looking she is That is the nna anrt nnlv hr.nnrl of flatterv thai hi carries in stock, and he applies it where he desires to please, with a liberal lib-eral hand over the fair or homely. And then he sits back with a contented mind, conscious of having done his best, and waits to see the woman grin like a chessy cat with pleasure. It never even occurs to him to praise the woman's mind or soul, or to reall try to find out what she thinks on any subject more profound than what's the gayest cabaret in town or the newest two-step It would astonish that man to death to know that even the beauty would ibe a million times more flattered a1 having a man recognize that she had gray matter inside of her head than she is at having his praise the golden locks on the outside of it, and that the .plain woman actually resents a com-ipllment com-ipllment to her looks becau- l i knows better and thinks tlmt the man is taking her for a fool as well as a frump The one compliment that coee to every woman's head like wine because be-cause she is so unaccustomed to it, is the subtle flattery of having a man t' appear eager to explore with her the curious labyrinths of the feminine mind, ivery woman is by nature a vlvisectionlst. and there is nothing that she takes such a keen delight in as in analyzing her emotions and delving down into the very depths of her ijoul. We all like to talk about ourselves. That's common human vanity. When men talk about themselves, they boast of what they have done. When women talk about themselves, they talk about what they feel. Women listen with patience, and even with interest, to men's accounts ol their achievements, but no man will listen woman discourses of her I emotions. Lovers wont stand for it even dur-i dur-i ing the days of courtship. Husbands cut it out. The only man on earth I who will listen to It, whose business lit is to listen to it, who it paid for J listening to it, is the preacher. H-nce. the clergyman is persona j grata with woman. He pays the woman no silly and idle compliments about the roses on her cheeks, or her violet eyes. His interest, officially at ( least, is in the state of her soul. Her ! emotions are the legitimate topic of conversation, and he listens while 6he Indulge! herself in an orgy of introspection. intro-spection. I To the preacher, she may tell, with out the certainty that he will change the topic of conversation as soon as j she pauses for breath, of the real things that she thinks when she com-Imunes com-Imunes with her own soul; of the strange impulses that animate her heart; of the aspirations that reach out beyond the frivolous little life to which she is often bound and that seek the stars. And the preacher listens, and sym pathizes, and understands, unless he is an utter dolt, and the woman is so grateful to the one man who recognizes recog-nizes that she has a soul and mind that she is ready to marry him it that be possible, and, if he is not. to adore him on just general principles. That's the secret of the fatal fascination fascin-ation that preachers have for women. And it holds a tip to every young man who is going a-courting Praise of her looks is old stuff to a woman. She's been fed on it all her life, but for a man to display an interest in a girl s soul, and what, she thinks she thinks, is flattery so subtle and unusual unus-ual it intoxicates her like strong drink. |