own with
contempt upon another who perhaps has sinned but once, but who has not
been as clever a mistress of the art of deception.

"This regard for reputation, independent of its being one of the
natural rewards of virtue, however, took its rise from a cause that
I have already deplored as the grand source of female depravity,
the impossibility of regaining respectability by a return to
virtue, though men preserve theirs during the indulgence of vice.
It was natural for women then to endeavor to preserve what, once
lost, was lost forever, till, this care swallowing up every other
care, reputation for chastity became the one thing needful for the
sex."

As pernicious as the effects of distorted conceptions of virtue are those
which arise from unnatural social distinctions. This is a return to the
proposition relating to the necessity of equality with which the book
opens. In treating it in detail the question of woman's work is more
closely studied. The evils which the difference of rank creates are
aggravated in her case. Men of the higher classes of society can, by
entering a political or military life, make duties for themselves. Women
in the same station are not allowed these channels of escape from the
demoralizing idleness and luxury to which their social position confines
them. On the other hand, women of the middle class, who are above menial
service but who are forced to work, have the choice of a few despised
employments. Milliners and mantua-makers are respected only a little more
than prostitutes. The situation of governess is looked upon in the light
of a degradation, since those who fill it are gentlewomen who never
expected to be _humiliated_ by work. Many women marry and sacrifice their
happiness to fly from such slavery. Others have not even this pitiful
alternative. "Is not that government then very defective, and very
unmindful of the happiness of one half of its members, that does not
provide for honest, independent women, by encouraging them to fill
respectable stations?" It is a melancholy result of civilization that the
"most respectable women are the most oppressed."

The next chapter, on Paternal Affection, leads to the third part of the
treatise. It is not enough for a reformer to pull down. He must build up
as well, or at least lay the foundation stone of a new structure. The
missionary does not only tell the heathen that his religion is false, bu