Christian socialism -- Fiction; German Americans -- Fiction; Shoemakers -- Fiction
“Do you suppose I have not seen,” she cried, “how you wish me to marry
him while pretending to oppose it? I am ashamed for you, Jennie, ashamed
to put your motive into words, because you are my brother’s wife. But
don’t delude yourself with the idea that it is your work; I would have
given up the money in any case rather than force him to act against what
he believes to be right; and I love him so dearly that I had rather
endure misery, cold, and hunger _with_ him than to be a queen without
him.”
Here, woman-like, her vehemence resolved itself into a burst of tears,
and, turning, she threw herself into the arms that were open to receive
her.
CHAPTER IV.
DREAMS AND DREAMERS.
Dora Weglein belonged to that large class of women in whom the heart is
far stronger than the head. Such women feel strongly, but reason weakly;
if the feeling be pure and right, their actions are the same; but if
selfishness clog the action of the heart, there is no head to appeal to.
These are the women who never theorize, or else theorize wide of the
mark, and whose husbands often are the happiest, whose children are the
best-behaved in the world.
Alice Randolph, on the contrary, was a woman of theory. It was to her
impossible to act without a clear knowledge of all the laws that ought
to govern such action; hence, as time and tide wait for no man, the
opportunity for action often passed while she was weighing pros and
cons; and hence, also, she frequently came to doubt the correctness of
her own conclusions, when their resulting action had lapsed into the
past.
That two women so different, when placed in circumstances almost exactly
similar, should choose the same course, is at least noteworthy; indeed
Alice found it rather too much noted. She was not aware of any sort of
reprehensible pride. It certainly would have mattered little to her if
Frederick Richards had been the son of a hangman, to put it as strongly
as possible, and she had proved herself not purse-proud; but it was—yes,
it _was_—very galling to be always likened and compared to Dorothea
Weglein, her sister’s German nursery governess. But in truth a woman of
theory and one of feeling (or shall I say instinct? It is a good old
word, and, while perhaps not strictly scientific, expresses my meaning
fairly well)—women of theory and women of instinct, then, are only too
apt mutually to look down upon and scorn one another. Dora, however,
loved and admired Miss Alice, and was strengthened in allegiance to her
lover by the knowledge of her young lady’s course.
“It is beautiful that she gives up all her money,” she said to Karl, as
they walked towards his home on the Sunday afternoon when, as his
betrothed, she was in all solemnity to take tea with his mother.
“She may be glad of it some day,” he answered grimly. “When the people
get their rights, they will have a heavy score to settle with Henry
Randolph. He has a heart as hard as his own nails.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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