They will smile,
yes, they will smile, though told that--
"In beauty's empire is no mean,
And woman either slave or queen,
Is quickly scorn'd when not ador'd."
But the adoration comes first, and the scorn is not anticipated.
Lewis the XIVth, in particular, spread factitious manners, and
caught in a specious way, the whole nation in his toils; for
establishing an artful chain of despotism, he made it the interest
of the people at large, individually to respect his station, and
support his power. And women, whom he flattered by a puerile
attention to the whole sex, obtained in his reign that prince-like
distinction so fatal to reason and virtue.
A king is always a king, and a woman always a woman: (And a wit,
always a wit, might be added; for the vain fooleries of wits and
beauties to obtain attention, and make conquests, are much upon a
par.) his authority and her sex, ever stand between them and
rational converse. With a lover, I grant she should be so, and her
sensibility will naturally lead her to endeavour to excite emotion,
not to gratify her vanity but her heart. This I do not allow to be
coquetry, it is the artless impulse of nature, I only exclaim
against the sexual desire of conquest, when the heart is out of the
question.
This desire is not confined to women; "I have endeavoured," says
Lord Chesterfield, "to gain the hearts of twenty women, whose
persons I would not have given a fig for.
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