H d/omaqqsPhilosophy of Love Caroline F Corbin -- - -- -- LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, -- @lprit. LZaj~rjrigfjt@a. .-- -------.- - 1 Shelf I I UBITED STATES OF AXERICA. 1- - -- I By CAROLINE F. CORBIN HIS MARRIAGE VOW 12mo. Cloth, $1.00; in paper cover, 50 cents. LEE AND SHEPARD Publishers Boston A WOMAN'S CAROLINE F. CORBIN Author of '< Rebecca," " His Marriage Vow," " Letters from a Chimney Corner," etc. I lotc: Love. Truth's no cleaner th~ngthan Love. ELIL\BETH BARKETTBKOWXING I Faith, Hope, Love, these three; but the greatest of these is Love. ST. PAUL La philosophie est une clef, qui ouvre tout, mais par dessus tout, qui ouvre l'esprit lui n12rne; qui lui donne une ~nethodepour arriver i la verit6; et par 1;i pr:~tique dc cette methodc, 1;~raison apprend i se separer cles impressions, le jusemcnt B s'eserccr i la lurniere des principes, et des lois. L'Pme tout entik~e,prend ainsi, une assiette solide. AusB DADOLLE I BOSTON -, -,,.- J!,i:.." . LEE AND SHEPARI) PUBLISHERS I0 MILK STKEET '893 2. .- Copyright, IS+?, by 1.e~.\xu SIIEPARD - -- A/I righls rrserz3ed A ~VOMAN'SPI~ILO~OPHYOF 1.0~~ BOSTON TO MY FOUR SONS Ebipi IittIe bask ie uffereb WITH A MOTHER'S LOVE "A% ~WO~IAN'S PH~LOSOPHYOF LOVE" is the outcome of thirty-five years of thought, study, and experience. It is not a book for babes, nor possibly for persons of a dark- ened and prurient mind; but it is believed that there is, both in this country and elsewhere, a large and grow- ing class of cultivated and thoughtful people, who see in the relations between nlen and women, the elementary principle of all civil order, the keynote of all social progress, and who will welcome a thoughtful and dispas- sionate discussion of some of those vexed questions of right and priority, which are forcing themselves into every field of thought and labor in Christendom. Such a discussion, if it be at all thorough, must neces- sarily include some topics which it is difficult to present without offence ; but the author has at least conscien- tiously endeavored to do justice to the truth, without dis- regarding those principles of delicacy which are rightly recognized as the safeguards of society. The measure of her success, it must be left for the public to decide. TABLE OF CONTENTS BOOK 1 LOVE AS THE DI\-ISE LIFE C)F THE PSIVERSE PAGE I. IS~~ROI)CC.TORT . I 11. THEGI:SESISOF I,(>\-E . 8 111. THE;\IOK.IL S.1~11-s OF LOVE . I9 I\-. THEI':VOT.U~IIOS(OF I .ov~ . 37 v. THEPK~ELEIZIOF TO-n.4~ . 60 BOOK 11 IdOSTEAS E':31130UIEI) IS TIII: iii)l\IE 1-1. THESIGVIFIC.~CEOF SEX . 69 \.IT. hI.4~~001)- ITS ~'O\VI-KS ;\XI) THEIR I,I;\IITA- 'I'JOSS . 78 \'Ill. ~~AsHOOI)-ITS NEEI)~ASD THE SOURCESOF THEIR I,EGITI\I.A.IESUPPI.\‘ . 93 IX. HE ~\IEAKXI~SSOF \\'O\IEX . 106 S. 'I'I~F. S.I.KF;S(:THor I\~O~I.~NHOOD. 115 8.. Vlll TABLE OF CONTEXTS PAGE XI. THEJVORTHOF WO~IAS'SWORK . 123 XII. TRUE-LOVERS'Lo\ E . 136 XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. XVIII. BOOK 111 LOVE IN ITS \VOI<LI)-IYIIIE IIE:L.\TIOSS xlx. THES~CI.-\I. K~~..~rrossOF \IES .-\XI) \VO\II.:S . 30S xx. \VOAIAN IS THE T\v~x.rlb:rt~ CESTURY . 217 xxr. THEHT(;IESICKEI~WIOXS OF LOYE . 23.3 XXII. LOVEAS A F;\c?.oR IS CI~II.GO\EI:SAIES~.. I. 342 XXIII. LOVE.is A FALTORIN CIVII,GO~EKSAIESI.. 1I. z60 xxrv. THEIAIPORTASCE OF RACE CULTURE . 271 APPENDIX . zg~ A WOMAN'S PHILOSOPHY OF LOVE ROOK I. A\S THE DIVINE LIFE OF THE UNIVERSE ROOK 11. AS EMBODIED IN THE HOME BOOK 111. IN ITS WORLD-WIDE RELATIONS I BOOK I LOVE AS THE DIVINE LIFE OF THE UNIVERSE ISTRODUCTOKY \J'rroso addresses himself to a discourse about love has a theme worthy the choiring of angels. It is \vide as the unirerse of God. old as the history of being. It is as deep as the heart of humanity, and in it lie hidden the springs of all delights, both of earth and of heaven. A411 grace and beauty have their source in it; all roillance and mystexy owe to it their char111 and lend to it their fasci~~ation.It is as luilliilous and pervasive as the sunlight, as subtle as the windiilgs of an Orieiital dream, as secret and incomprehen- sible as the counsels of the Almighty. From the cradle to the grave it is the sovereign of huillail destiny, which rises and falls to the voice of its melodies as inevitably as the sea rolls up its tides at the call of her mistress. It moos the infant to the bosoill of illotherhood ; its electric thrill flashes into the soul of the youth the strength, the joy, the inspira- tion, which are life ; it stays up the flagging energies of the adult upon whose shoulders rest the heavy burdens of human progress; it soothes the pathway of the aged to the tomb, and when the pearly gates swing open to the eillancipated spirit, what is the light, the joy, the glory, that ii revenled, but the divine atmosphere, the ineffable presence, of the Almighty, the Eternal Love ? From the earliest ages, all poetry, art, ancl philoso1)hy have been busy in celebrating the chnrnls, or strlclyingr the phe- nomena, or warning of the dangers of love. Eut from generation to generation the heart of hun~lnityh;ls ~)lungecl recklessly into this s~velling tide, which all its in>tincts proclaimed to be the tide of lice, only to be caught up on the wings of ecstasy one moment, ant1 1,lunged into the abyss of despair the next. l'hilosol~hy has contlen~netlthe passion, and .Art has satirize1.1 it, in vain. 'lhe ancients portrayed Venus as faithless :IS she was l)cautifill, an11 the blind boy-god expressed their notions of the fully of lo\-ing. Humanity accepted the boy-god for what he w,~s\vorth, 1)rlt knew all the while, in its o~ndeep lore, that not so shoultl the great principle of love be portrayed. ;\ spirit, strong, valiant, invincible, holding the keys of 1)eing in his grnslj, possessing the secrets of the mighty alchemy of lift: nntl death, of the suprrnle delights and the infinite eternal despairs of the hur.ia11 sorrl, r,tdiant with all thc glorici of the heavenly spheres, but with deeper shadows in his limning than human inlnginntion cnn conc:civc or x~ght but hunlan experience compass, and inclutling in hi.; mighty sway both the here and the herenfter,-this is the unin- carnate ide:ll of love which has tlominnted the human soul throughout all time. It is the spirit which brightens with unutterabie inspiration, or tlarkens mith a1)ysmal glooms, all epochs of human history. Infinite, mysterious, yet intinlate as the life of the soul itself, full of all celcstinl promise, yet replete also with the tlnrkest threatenings of fate, throughollt the history of the worlcl it has set at naught the ivistlolc INTRODUCTORY 3 of the philosophers, and proved itself the sphinx-riddle of the ages. Very bold, therefore, it would seem, must be the man or woman who in these later times should attempt to turn the key in the lock of this greatest of mysteries. Especially may it seem, at first glance, unpardonable temerity in a woman, to raise her voice as one who has caught a glimpse, by never so slight an angle, of that which is within the veil. Yet there is this to be said in behalf of such an one : No soul who has felt but the feeblest thrill of the divine inspiration of love but will confess at once to its dualistic nature. Call woman the weaker vessel if you will, thrust cal inferiority, -the one immutable fact remains that man can know nothing of either the joy or the beneficence of love without her. Let him send out the strong voice of his passion into all the earth, though there may be millions of his own sex within hearing, the world is a void to him, . if ~~omnndo not answer. He may despise her capacity for love even, may say that it is, as compared with his own, as nloonlight unto sunlight, as water unto wine," yet her re- sponse, such as it is, is all that the universe affords him. Go where he hill, through all the range of human experi- ence, he will find nothing human that is more perfect or more satisfying. That other half of him may be the better half or the weaker half, whichever he chooses to call it: true, it foIlows logically that by just so much as woman is diverse from man, must she be in possession of truth con- cerning this mutual experience, which man can never corn '1 .% \VO~I.~S'S J~HlI,OSOl1HYOF 1.0VE pass nor understand except as she reveal. it to him. 'I'hat other h,df of love which he kno\vs not, which al\vi~yshas beell and always will be, ill some sense, n mystery to hiin, is in her possession. She, aild she alone, can fit it to hi.; own experience, and make of the two a perfect sl)here of 'Through all the ages women have listcneti \\.it11 rapt aston- ishment, so~lleti~llesclrmliiiecl with less revcreilt .;enti~nents, to the floods of elocluence nhich IIICII have 1)o11rctl forth co~lcer~lingthe ])assion of love as seen from their stanil1)c)int.