The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, July 7, 1901, Page 9

'THE SUNDAY CALL. 722 L Ji B | 7 least. They have all showed an inclina- tion to talk round and round it, and not to step up and hit it square in the face. Perhaps it struck some of them too personally; perhaps some of ther were afraid of having too many ex- planations to make after the sympo- sium appeared in print. They are a good representative group who have handled the subject popularly, from the standpoint of in- dividual experience or observation. You will notice that there isn’t a pro- fessional psychologist in the bunch. And I am not going to play the psy- chologist by counting how many of the men think men and how many of the women think women, and how many of the men think women and how many— . There! Suffice it. My best wishes that the delivery of this morning’s paper leaves nobody in hot water. KATERYN MARSH. Judge Carroll Cook Thinks That Women Carry Off the Prize. T struck me that Judge Cook was a very good man to start out with. He ought to have two points of view; that of the criminal lawyer and judze who has watched the crime-bound emotions of men and women, and that of the recently married man. Perhaps the latter is what made him a bit diffident about exprussing his mind. I noticed a certain diffidence with all the rarried ones, for that matter. Perhs they have begun to realize how little tk know about it all, anyway. “I couldn’'t say—I reaily couldn't--I don't know anything about it,” he in- ed. According to the trick of his trad he had me backed against a lighted wail while he was between me and the window and I couldn’t see him clearly. “But surely you bave some ideas on the subject. Do more men or more women sue for divorce?” ““More’ women." “What does that indicate? are more fickle, or that ficklenes husbands’ part has prompted suit?” ouldp’t say.” “Which commit Iove?” “Far more men.” “Because they love better?” “No; because women are too timid to kilL" ‘“‘Although they may love as much?” “Oh, I don’t know. I really don’t know anything about it. But I'll tell you. I think that women carry off the prize for affection every time—if you want to know what I think.” Which was exactly what I did want. Scme Things That a Minister Has to Say on the Subject. When Father Parrish opened to me the door of his famous basement he had just emerged from a wedding. 1 waded to him through inches of rice and stumbled over an old shoe at the threshold. 1t looked as if he might be in a frame of mind to discuss the affections. “Ministers ought to know human nature if anybody does,” I said. “You see the great crises of life, the times when lov is put to the test. Which loves better— man or woman?" “Oh, woman, woman, beyond a doubt, woman,” was what he exclaimed offhand. But he begged to be permitted to write out his opinions on the subject instead of being interviewed. I gave him several days to do it in, and you see that by the time he had thaught the matter over he wasn't so sure. Here is what he wrote: By Father Herbert Parrish. Most people remembering Nancy Sykes would probably give the palm to woman's long-suffering affection for man. I see, however, that in the divorce statistics a large majority of the suits for separation are begun by women. This may not prove anything. Still it is interesting. In regard to the psychological difference between men and women you must con- sult an expert. There is said to be some- thing in the maternal instinct which may account for th: patience shown by some women for the mwen everybody else would hate. I remember that Professor Baris Sidis in his work on the psychology of suggestion says that women can rarely rise above the tribe and are Philistines by nature. But this is a hard saying. Ideally ther2 should be an equality at least in the durability If not in the quality and capacity of the affections of each sex. As a matter of fact the general depend- ence of women upon men puts a compul- sion upon loyalty. In her judgment of the man a woman is handicapped. She lacks experience, and at the marriageable age idealizes absurd- ly. Her imagination makes a king of a cad. Later on, when she sees more of the world and finds the type reiterated or dis- covers from experience that she has made a mistake, she is apt to rush to the other extreme. Then she decides to get a di- vorce or joins a strong-minded woman's club. Men, on the other hand, with wider ex- perience in the world, have less imagina- tion in affairs of the heart. With them disenchantment is less disastrous. I should say, however, that too often in both sexes affection is only a species of blind idolatry. It is foolish in its incep- tion and fatal to happiness of a per- manent order in its result. The golden rule says that we should love our neigh- bor as ourself. Most people violate this rule by loving the majority of their neigh- bors a good deal less than themselves and by loving some of their neighbors a good deal more than themselves. I do not think that women are any worse than men in loving “not wisely but too well.” Dr. W. F. McNutt Discusses the Problem Pro and Con. A doctor is another of the men who ought to know. Doctors should be the novelists and dra- [[T is a ticklish subject, to say the That on their more murders for matists of the world. And just because they have the opportunity they are pre- vented, as a rule, from using it, for the reason that scientists are not artists. Dr. ‘Weir Mitchell is the only man I can cail to mind on the instant who has achieved bigness in both lines. Bi, McNutt received me In the atmos- phere of eminence, which atmosphere is known by such barometrical indications as a capped and aproned attendant, a long wait, much solcmnity about being admit- ted to the presence and a great deal of big carved furniture when you get there. Dr. McNutt received the problem as he might receive a puzziing case of appen- dicitis. It was to be considered serious! and weighed deliberately. “This s very interesting and very deep,” he launched out slowly. *“It is a question to require much time and thought.” “But try something offhand.” I urged. “It's the kind of a subject, too, that one knows almost as’ much about offhand as after study “But it involves too many conditions to be treated in a hurry,” he insisted. “In sickness, what do you s I hur- ried on. “Is a man more faithful to a suffering wife than she to him?" The doctor pondered. The doctor dis- cussed, more with himself than with me. And he finally came to the conclusion that it is all a matter of the tempera- ment of the individual, and that, speaking generally, the matter is nip and tuck. “I khave seen sickness bring out all the worst traits in both men and women,” he said. /“I have seen those husbands and wives who have been loving enough in the smooth waters of life show gross neglect and disloyalty when the life partner was suffering and ill. “And I have seen just the opposite. I have seen times of distress bring out the most beautiful qualities of tenderness and loyalty. I have seen big, rough husbands turn nurse and take care of a sick wife with a tenderness that only true love could have taught them. And as for wives—'Oh, woman! in our hours of e? ease— He was caught there, and I hastened to rescue hum, for I saw that the dear old doctor had warmed to a very pretty sen- timentality of the old school, and his mood had its charm. “Yes—'a ministering angel thou,’ " he repeated. “There's another point about ill health,” he went on. “Love, as I have said, some- times weakens when the object of the love is ill. Iliness weakens love in another way—the one suffering often loves less. Emotions are apt to be weaker in a per- son of weak physique.’] There's something to think about. P. J. McCormick, the Chief Deputy Coroner, Has Something to Say. The Coroner wasn't in. The chief dep- uty was, and I told him he would do. He picture taken and I having his walted. “I wonder if you'd mind letting me look pleasant at you?’ he inquired, dolefully ‘This is a hard place to get up a smile in.” “Yes, I guess I see trouble enough to know somethinz about the affections,” he went on when the matter was explained to him. ‘“Murders for love, suicides for love. I guess I ought to know a thing or two. “More women, I should say, without looking over the records, far more women commit suicide for love than men. To be e 1o doubt many men whose ide is assigned as something when in reality it is love that is the ect cause. Financial affairs often ap- while love is at the bottom eof the trouble. A woman does not have financial affa to serve as an excuse. But, even so, there are more women who suicide for love, T am sure. “Women are more impulsive. Time will heal any pain, and a man realizes this better, and gives time a chance. Woman does not. “More murders for love are probably committed by men. A man puts the other one out of business; a woman gets rid of herself. But very likely these murders are often no indication of real love—only a spiteful jealousy. “But does anybody think of doubting that women love better than men? How can they? To me there is no doubt. I tell you, if a fellow's in trouble it's woman that he wants to comfort him. If he's sick, it's a pity for kim if he nas to do with a man for a nurse. It's a woman's affecticn he wants. Of course they love better than m And I'm called an au- thority on love affairs, too.” Mrs. E. G. Denniston, President of the Forum Club, Is Neutral. i Mrs. Denniston is president of a pros- perous club, mingles in prosperous so- clety, and receives in a prosperous home. Her point of view is a very different one from those of the men who have watched love through its trials of sin and sickness and poverty. Her view is that of a hap- pily housed woman. She sounds so, too. She doesn't talk much abeut the heart breakings and dis- loyalties. She concerns herself with the loyalties. “I think women are just as affectionate as men, and that men are just as affec- tionate as women,” she said. “I have seen the most beautiful cases of lifelong devotion on both sides.” “Does a man love the more intensely?" “I don’t think so. Of course convention- ality permits him to show his feeling first, to express himself.” “Does he love longer?” “I don’t think that, either. I don’t think stability is a question of sex.” “And to sum up?” *I think it all depends on the Individual. There are both kinds of women and both kinds of men. I don’t think either sex loves better. “There ought to be more happiness on both sides in the future,” she went on. It was the club woman speaking. “Women are so much more independent, agd there- fore marry later in life. “I suppose they are the same women at heart,” she added. sure, ther a Blanche Bates Gives Some Very De- cided Opinions on the Matter. Miss Bates was getting out of Cigar- ette’s negligee costume and Into the dap- per one of Blanche Bates. She was hook- ing her belt and she jerked it with a vig- orcus, not to say vicious, tug when the question was propounded to her. “The idea that such a question should be raised at all!” she cried, “as if there were any doubt about which does all the loving." She seemed to consider the matter set- tled at this, but I was still in doubt. Did she mean that a woman's affection was “as moenlight unto sunlight and as water urto wine,” or did she mean that love “is to man a thing apart”’? 1 asked her. “The idea “as if wo= men didn’t do all the loving there is done in this world!" she reitera aps I shouldn't say quite all,” she purse, there do exist a few, a very few noble men who are capable of great love and great sacrifice for a wo= are truly noble and os be anything else. But they are so rare that they are rdly worth considering in laving down man b G Do « general laws ey are only the excep- tion that has to be to prove the rule. “But as for women— love to love. They will give their lives to men who don’t care for them more than for a dog. I belleve they even love to be abused by the object of their adoration. A woman's life is all sacrifice, all devotion to the man whom she loves. She will let herself be walked over. There is no limit to what uffer for the man of her choice.” en perfect love—mu- she will “Have vou ever t love and it was the most beautiful thing in the world—but it didn’t last. Pere fect things never do. While two people are loving each eother they are living ab- solutely perfect iives for the time. But it's no use for a woman to expect it to continue. A man doesn’t know the mean ing of the word love in an absolute and ting sense. He isn’t capable of the sacrifice which love involves. “I sometimes think that women are happler being unhappy in love than they would be if it were all smooth sailing. A woman enjoys suffering. “The reason that she does so much more of it than a man is that love is her business in life. Men live broader lives and the perspective is changed accord= ingly.” “I think I've got that down In good or- der,” I said, making a last note as she snapped the elastic of her hat. “Goode b h, you're not going to print all ¥ said!” She was running after me. “Now, Miss Bates''— “Oh, well, go ahead. I'll stand for any- thing I've said if you'll only be sure to ze that I say woman is THH R Ard T promised Miss Walford of St. Luke’s Hospital Nurses’ Home Decides for Women. Nurses know In the same way that doc- Perhaps they know better, being Take the intuition of their sex it with their opportunities nature and they tors do. women. nd combine tudying human it to have learned. ford struck me as so gentle in all the time surprised he showed of looking through. Do you find that men are devoted to their wives through sickness?” I asked her. ery much N riy all men are. ery strong.” sense of duty i Their “Ah! That's another point. The ques- tion rea is, Do men love as well as women? Duty isn’t love.” “No, and therein lies a big difference that I have noted. I don't think women sacrifice themselves for a man, devote themselves to him in sickness, unless they love him. On the other hand, a man will devote himself to a woman through his .sense of duty, even though love doesn’t enter in. I have one in mind now. Hs nursed his wife with the tenderest care through a long sickne: He spared no expense in doing all for her that could be done, although he could ill afford it, and all the time I don’t think he cared a pin about her. A woman in the same cir- cumstances would not have dome that. She must love a man to be good to him. “And do women love less than men?" “I don’t think so. I don't think they love as bard, although I have seen some that were volcanc but as a rule the man is the one who feels the more intense passion. “A woman loves longer, though. She has the stability, man the intensity." Mrs. Arthur Cornwall of the Red Cross Society and the California Club Thinks Men Are Bet- ter Than They Are Believed to Be. Mrs. Cornwall insisted that she didn't know anything about the affections. Her looks belied her. “I knew a great deal about men, though,” she said. “A great deal more than I do about women. For although I'm a club woman, I have had more deal- ings with men than with my own sex. The Red Cross has taught me a lot.” “What has it taught ycu about men In their affections?” I coaxed, but she was not to be trapped. “I don’t know anything about their af- fections,” she persisted, “but a great deal about their character. They are better than they are half believed to be. I like men.” “Do you find their affections more last- ing thau those of women?" “That I don’t know. I don’t know any- thing about the versus of the matter. I only know what men are. They are tree mendously stable. They are loyal friends.” than women?" 1 can’t say.” Are they intense in feeling?* ‘““I'ney are not emotional, but they are stable, reliable.” Are women emotional?™ ry emotional. That much I know, Our emotions must be played upon all the time to keep us amused. We must be diverted with something new.” And we need new playthings for our ffections?” No, no, I don’t believe that. I admire and respect women. I am a club woman myself. All I say is that F don't know so much about them as I do about men, What I know of them is nearly all good.” Men stable but not emotional; women emotional but not—no, she didn’t say that. However, she has laid down laws that are general and ought to appiy specifically to the affections. Why not? If men are stable, reliable by nature, they must be lasting and true in their affections. 1f they are not emotional, they cannot be intemse. If women are emotional in a vacillating way, why net the same in love affairs? But remember, Mrs. Cornwall did not draw any of these conclusions. These are the reader's. She was characterizing far more gererally. For she says tiat she doesn’t know any- thing about the affections — that big- hearted woman who has slaved in the slavery of the Red Cross labors, carrying a big share of the brunt of the work for three years past. She calls her work & ays that she is like all womesy in need of diversion, I know betger.