looks at her sister-in-law's babies, nor strains them passionately to her heart, nor deems it a privilege to nurse her nephews through whooping-cough and measles, nor offers herself in any fashion as a holocaust upon other people's domestic altars? What if, holding her life in her two hands, and knowing it to be her only real possession, she disposes of it in the way she feels will give her most content, swimming smoothly in the stream of her own nature, and clearly aware that happiness lies in the development of her individual tastes and acquirements? Such a woman may, as Mr. Brownell says, exhibit transparently "her native and elemental inconsistencies;" but she calls for no commiseration, and perhaps adds a trifle to the harmonious gayety of earth.
That she should be censured for laying claim to what is truly hers seems unkind and irrational,—a tyranny of opinion. Marriage is a delightful thing; but it is not, and never can be, a duty; nor is it as a duty that men and women have hitherto zealously practised it. The outcry against celibacy as a "great social disease" is louder than the situation warrants.
