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A PIONEER OF THE MOVEMENT
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Female modesty was held to be outraged by the confession of strong and enduring love from a woman to a man, even when that man was her husband. Dr. Gregory advises a wife "never to let her husband know the extent of her sensibility or affection." He likewise cautions all women carefully to hide their good sense and knowledge if they happen to possess any. "Be cautious," he says, "even in displaying your good sense. It will be thought you assume a superiority over the rest of the company. But if you happen to have any learning, keep it a profound secret, especially from the men, who generally look with a jealous and malignant eye on a woman of great parts, and a cultivated understanding." Pretence, seeming, outward show were the standards by which a woman's character was measured. A man is taught to dread the eye of God; but women were taught to dread nothing but the eye of man. Rousseau embodies the then current doctrine, that reputation in the case of women takes the place of virtue, in a passage which Mary Wollstonecraft quotes. "To women," he says, "reputation is no less indispensable than chastity: . . . what is thought of her is as important to her as what she really is. It follows hence that the system of a woman's education should in this respect be directly contrary to that of ours. Opinion is the grave of virtue among the men, but its throne among women." Right through this tangle of pretences and affectations Mary Wollstonecraft cuts with the double-edged knife of a sound heart and clear head. It is against the system of dissimulation that she