Hence, even Rousseau declared: _Women have, in
general, no love for any art; they have no proper knowledge of any;
and they have no genius_.[1]
[Footnote 1: Lettre a d'Alembert, Note xx.]
No one who sees at all below the surface can have failed to remark the
same thing. You need only observe the kind of attention women bestow
upon a concert, an opera, or a play--the childish simplicity, for
example, with which they keep on chattering during the finest passages
in the greatest masterpieces. If it is true that the Greeks excluded
women from their theatres they were quite right in what they did;
at any rate you would have been able to hear what was said upon the
stage. In our day, besides, or in lieu of saying, _Let a woman keep
silence in the church_, it would be much to the point to say _Let a
woman keep silence in the theatre_. This might, perhaps, be put up in
big letters on the curtain.
And you cannot expect anything else of women if you consider that the
most distinguished intellects among the whole sex have never managed
to produce a single achievement in the fine arts that is really great,
genuine, and original; or given to the world any work of permanent
value in any sphere.
Pages:
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119