Tales and Novels Patronage v 1516 Author:Maria Edgeworth Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: ANSWER THE PRECEDING LETTER. I Have as little taste for Mad. Dacier's learned ragout as you can have, my dear sir; and I pity the great scholar who travell... more »ed to Constantinople for the termagant Theodora, believing, as you do, that the honourable mention made of her by the French Academy of Sciences could be no adequate compensation to her husband for domestic disquiet: but the lady's learning was not essential to his misfortune ; he might have met with a scolding dame, though he had not married a Grecian. A profusion of vulgar aphorisms in the dialects of all the counties in England, proverbs in Welsh, Scottish, French, Spanish, Italian, and Hebrew, might be adduced to provo that scolds are to be found among all classes of women. I am, however, willing to allow, that the more learning, and wit, and eloquence a lady possesses, the more troublesome and the more dangerous she may become as a wife or daughter, unless she is also possessed of good sense and good temper. Of your honest Sir Charles Harrington's two pattern wives, I think I should prefer the country housewife, with whom I could be sure of having good cheese and butter, to the citty dame with her good clothes and answers witty. I should be afraid that these answers witty might be turned against me, and might prove the torment of my life. You, who have attended to female disputants, must have remarked, that, learned or unlearned, they seldom know how to reason; they assert and declaim, employ wit, and eloquence, and sophistry, to confute, persuade, or abash their adversaries ; but distinct reasoning they neither use nor comprehend. Till women learn to reason, it is in vai- that they acquire learning. You are satisfied, I am sure, with this acknowledgment. I will go farther, and at once give up to you all the learne...« less