The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1900-03-18
SAINT Or sinner?
Some Discussion as to the
Woman Man Seeks.
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX
Starts the Other Wise Ones
Taking All at Once.

Wheeler Wilcox at a CLUB meeting Of wO-
lnen in New York the other day, have
aroused a great deal of discussion and
much reproach.
She must be chaste as proud Diana was,
Yet warm as Venus;
As wise as Phyrne in the art Of love,
Good as the best and tempting as the
worst
A saint, a sinner and paradox.
In real life is this the sort Of woman a
man would make his wife and the mother
Of his children?
Mans ideal woman today is the woman
he selects for the highest position he
has in his power to bestow.
Therefore it is fitting that the woman
quoted here below should all be wives.
Each one represents the ideal of some
man. From at beast one point of view
HIS-each can speak as one having au-
thority.
OF the two men who add their testi-
rnony both are well known as diagnosti-
clans of love and have analysed it in all
sorts of ways.
Between Madame Recamier the most
beautiful and ourest woman of Napo-
Icons corrupt court, who stands for what
Mrs. Wilcox is pleased 70 cali ''cold vir-
tue" and The Carmen and "Sappho"
types. the men and women of the Jour
nails jury seem TO agree as to which sort
is mans ideal
Henry T. Finck, the distinguished au-
thor of Primitive Love-" says: MANY
women have been sinners first, saints af-
terward. To be saint and sinner at
h.. Il =
even women-whom Pope has called at
best a contradiction'-canno achieve But
woman may have all the charms of
sinner without being a sinner, and all the
virtues Of a saint without being sanity in
the austere sense Of REFRESHING all natur-
al impulses.
The ideal woman is as pure as new
blown rose. and at the same time as
agreeable to the senses.
~ he most important problem for every
girl to consider is how much of its fra
GRANGE a rose can afford TO expend before
is has been plucked by the rightfuI own
er. We see young men crowding around
the buds that are most lavishly fragrant,
but 1 have noticed that these buds are
often allowed to become fulI-blown roses
and to fade, while 4 her buds, little less
eager to yield their fragrance and to be
stuck in the button holes of casual ad-
mirers, are the ones that men turn to
when they think seriously of marriage
ITO a sociologist Mrs. Wilcox's lines are
simply a poets way of stating the prob
lem of coyness, which has perplexed wo-
men since time immemorial. / have prov
ed in my recent work on Primitive Love
hof ge
sal trait of femininity, but is aboriginally
absent There have been times and coun-
tries in which women did the counting
and the proposing; but the custom, be-
ing abnormal, did not survive The ex-
periences Of ages has taught women that
their best weapon against fans agrees
iveness and superior power is a coy re-
serve. The history Of society and Of NOR
ais may be divided into epochs of alter
nate license and restraint. l fear that
at present we are entering an epoch of
license. thanks to the influence of the New
Woman. with her scorn for reserve and
the peculiar craze among girls-even
when they are not obliged toto leave
home. the sanctuary of feminine refine
rent
The ideal woman is one just coy
enough-not too coy. She may be nkenei
10 piece Of music properly interpreted.
The eminent song writer. Robert Franz.
once remarked that A singer who takes
a song too fast is a fool. and one who
takes it too slow is a fool. too
'Stillas every musician knows,it is bet
ter to take it too slow than too fast. The
instinct for the right pace is the most
man-to acquire; all the more difficult be-
cause times chonge and men change with !
them.
"Phryne was a sinner without trace or
even Dretext of saintIiness Her art of !
love would not fascinate a refined man
Of the present day"
Mrs. George H. Winkler says: MANS |
ideal woman is the woman who. according /
70 his ideal Of Himself or of what he |
should wish to be best appreciates him /
This subtle quality. which makes itself /
felt by the recipient when none other |
may perceive it. viii lead a man through |
a crowd of women to the one particular |
woman.
she must he particular Oh. my. yes. |
or he VIII not have her. y moral woman /
has a thousand chances Of being asked |
in marriage To an immoral woman's one. !
There may be one man who falls a hope /
less victim TO her charms one perhaps in /
a thousand willing 70 make her the moth |
er OF his children
But to go back 20 my first proposi- !
ton. the woman who is to him the one /
woman in the world shows him that she |
IS n rq hot III = },
man by her appreciation of him She
has intention Of divine sort. She un-
derstands in a moment the sort Of man
he longs To be. and TO her he is that man.
Without any plan to deceive she shows
him If he is short and would be tall. for
instance that she thinks he is tall. If he
would be brilliant he is so in her eyes.
whose depths he alone may read.
In short he may be the most common
place individual in the world. bue she is
Ike Titania, blind 10 her lovers defects
Even the ASS head enchants her"
Mrs Richard Stearns. First she must
b. wholly feminine. but not the meek
and sDiritess creature, limp I'm body and
mind. which was once supposed 10 typ!fv
the feminine woman. Not The 'yweet Al
ice type. who 'wept with delight when
he gave her smile. and tremb.ed with
fright at his frown'
she must possess the characteristics
Of a comrade- She must be congeniaL
frank. spontaneous. sympathetic and suf-
1ciently admiring 10 convey q subtle
sense Of mans superiority All the world
viii acknowledge this TO be a harmless
deception and in no way calculated 10
Place her in the category OF Mrs VII
-lN-- sinners