A woman has
nothing now to blush for; she need not slander or whisper, hide her
face or reveal it. A fan is of no use now but for fanning herself.
When once a thing is no more than what it is, it is too useful to be a
form of luxury."
"Everything in France has aided and abetted the 'perfect lady,' " said
Daniel d'Arthez. "The aristocracy has acknowledged her by retreating
to the recesses of its landed estates, where it has hidden itself to
die--emigrating inland before the march of ideas, as of old to foreign
lands before that of the masses. The women who could have founded
European /salons/, could have guided opinion and turned it inside out
like a glove, could have ruled the world by ruling the men of art or
of intellect who ought to have ruled it, have committed the blunder of
abandoning their ground; they were ashamed of having to fight against
the citizen class drunk with power, and rushing out on to the stage of
the world, there to be cut to pieces perhaps by the barbarians who are
at its heels. Hence, where the middle class insist on seeing
princesses, these are really only ladylike young women.
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