No American had ever been truly
afraid of either.
This problem in dynamics gravely perplexed an American
historian. The Woman had once been supreme; in France she still
seemed potent, not merely as a sentiment, but as a force. Why was
she unknown in America? For evidently America was ashamed of her,
and she was ashamed of herself, otherwise they would not have
strewn fig-leaves so profusely all over her. When she was a true
force, she was ignorant of fig-leaves, but the
monthly-magazine-made American female had not a feature that
would have been recognized by Adam. The trait was notorious, and
often humorous, but any one brought up among Puritans knew that
sex was sin. In any previous age, sex was strength. Neither art
nor beauty was needed. Every one, even among Puritans, knew that
neither Diana of the Ephesians nor any of the Oriental goddesses
was worshipped for her beauty. She was goddess because of her
force; she was the animated dynamo; she was reproduction -- the
greatest and most mysterious of all energies; all she needed was
to be fecund. Singularly enough, not one of Adams's many schools
of education had ever drawn his attention to the opening lines of
Lucretius, though they were perhaps the finest in all Latin
literature, where the poet invoked Venus exactly as Dante invoked
the Virgin: --
"Quae quondam rerum naturam sola gubernas.
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