For it is by virtue of his reasoning faculty that man does
not live in the present only, like the brute, but looks about him and
considers the past and the future; and this is the origin of prudence,
as well as of that care and anxiety which so many people exhibit. Both
the advantages and the disadvantages which this involves, are shared
in by the woman to a smaller extent because of her weaker power
of reasoning. She may, in fact, be described as intellectually
short-sighted, because, while she has an intuitive understanding of
what lies quite close to her, her field of vision is narrow and does
not reach to what is remote; so that things which are absent, or past,
or to come, have much less effect upon women than upon men. This is
the reason why women are more often inclined to be extravagant, and
sometimes carry their inclination to a length that borders upon
madness. In their hearts, women think that it is men's business
to earn money and theirs to spend it--- if possible during their
husband's life, but, at any rate, after his death. The very fact
that their husband hands them over his earnings for purposes of
housekeeping, strengthens them in this belief.
However many disadvantages all this may involve, there is at least
this to be said in its favor; that the woman lives more in the present
than the man, and that, if the present is at all tolerable, she enjoys
it more eagerly.
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