The brilliancy and originality of his views on social questions appear in such startling announcements as "Woman should be true to herself." "Woman was created to be a wife and a mother." "The accomplished woman in these days of general education is, however, a grand mistake." "Why should lovely woman ever condescend to dabble in political economy? Can a gentleman be a gentleman when logic requires the truth? Will dry dissertation fill up the place of compliment and flowery talk? Will agricultural measures,--Mill on Liberty,--Buckle on Civilization,--High, Low, or Middle Church,--Pleiocene periods,--Hind's new comet, and the division of labor, suffer us to enjoy life as we used, and to amuse ourselves with the innocent prattle of ladies' tongues?" Rosy, posy, pinky, honey, pepper_mint_, and sugar-plummy! "One part of management in husbands lies in a judicious mixture of good-humor, attention, flattery, and compliments." Here, helping him to his meaning, which he flounders after in vain through a page of wish-wash, we may explain that he is not speaking, as would naturally be supposed, of the manner in which husbands manage wives, but, advancing in his usual crab-fashion, of the manner in which wives manage husbands; nor by flattery let it be imagined for a moment that he means flattery, but "an offered flower, a birthday gift, a song when we are weary, a smile when we are sad, a look which no eye but our own will see," in which, if truth is, as has been said, "a fixed central sun," our comet must be considered in its perihelion. And having thus set him on his feet again, let us see whether he can stand by himself a tottering moment or two. The preventive of these ill-assorted marriages (which for the greater part are never made) is, if the young men "only chose by sense _or_ fancy, _or_ because they saw some good quality in a girl,--if they were not all captivated by the face alone," (Query: What is being captivated by a face but choosing by fancy? and what is choosing by sense but choosing by some good quality?) "every Jill would have her Jack, and pair off happily, like the lovers in a comedy." At the same time he agrees with Swift that the reason why so many marriages are unhappy is because young ladies spend their "time in making nets and not in making cages."