Male and female heads are distinct in expression, but
equal in beauty, strength and calmness. Each male head is that of a
brother and a king,--each female of a sister and a queen. Could the
thought thus expressed be lived out, there would be nothing more to be
desired. There would be unison in variety, congeniality in difference.
Coming nearer our own time, we find religion and poetry no less true
in their revelations. The rude man, just disengaged from the sod, the
Adam, accuses Woman to his God, and records her disgrace to their
posterity. He is not ashamed to write that he could be drawn from
heaven by one beneath him,--one made, he says, from but a small part
of himself. But in the same nation, educated by time, instructed by a
succession of prophets, we find Woman in as high a position as she has
ever occupied, No figure that has ever arisen to greet our eyes has
been received with more fervent reverence than that of the Madonna.
Heine calls her the _Dame du Comptoir_ of the Catholic church,
and this jeer well expresses a serious truth.
And not only this holy and significant image was worshipped by the
pilgrim, and the favorite subject of the artist, but it exercised an
immediate influence on the destiny of the sex.
Pages:
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74