"It is quite true,"
said Joseph de Maistre, "that women have produced no CHEFS-
DOEUVRE. They have written no 'Iliad,' nor 'Jerusalem Delivered,'
nor 'Hamlet,' nor 'Phaedre,' nor 'Paradise Lost,' nor 'Tartuffe;'
they have designed no Church of St. Peter's, composed no
'Messiah,' carved no 'Apollo Belvidere,' painted no 'Last
Judgment;' they have invented neither algebra, nor telescopes, nor
steam-engines; but they have done something far greater and better
than all this, for it is at their knees that upright and virtuous
men and women have been trained--the most excellent productions
in the world."
De Maistre, in his letters and writings, speaks of his own mother
with immense love and reverence. Her noble character made all
other women venerable in his eyes. He described her as his
"sublime mother"--"an angel to whom God had lent a body for a
brief season." To her he attributed the bent of his character, and
all his bias towards good; and when he had grown to mature years,
while acting as ambassador at the Court of St. Petersburg, he
referred to her noble example and precepts as the ruling
influence in his life.
One of the most charming features in the character of Samuel
Johnson, notwithstanding his rough and shaggy exterior, was the
tenderness with which he invariably spoke of his mother (5)--a
woman of strong understanding, who firmly implanted in his mind,
as he himself acknowledges, his first impressions of religion.
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