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SECTION II.
An Idea os the German Women.
It has been asserted , that men , in savage andbarbarous periods , are carried to the sex merelyfrom the incitement of animal gratification, andthat they seel not the power of beauty, nor thepleasures which arise from love; and a multitudeof facts have been produced from history to con-firm this theory. It is concluded, of consequence,that . in such times, women are in an abject stateof servility , from which they advance not tillthe ages of prosperity (t).
One would fancy it notwithstanding, consistentwith reason , to imagine, that the sexes, in everyperiod of society , are important to each other ;and that, the member of a rude community, as wellas the polished citizen, is susceptible of tendernessand sentiment. He is a stranger, indeed, to themetaphysic of love, and to the fopperies of gal-lantry ; but his heart cannot be insensible to femaleattractions He cannot but be drawn by beauty;he must know a preference in the objects of hisaffection; and he must feel and experience , in acertain degree, at least, that bewitching intercourse,and those delightful agitations, which constitutethe greatest charm of cultivated life.
This opinion, 1 conceive, is strongly confirmedby the history of the Germanic states I heir generalcharacter, with particular and obvious facts, illuk