We do not claim that this system is perfect; our aim is precisely to examine with the utmost care its strong and its weak points; but it is certain that, to begin with, by the side of almost all the illustrious men who then flourished in such numbers, we see the indispensable woman silhouetting herself, not as tyrant or even director, but as mentor and guide—as mother, rather, since she brings them forth into the higher life; or, still better, as light and sun, as reinvigorating, vivifying warmth: according to the saying of Schiller, “Love is the sun of Genius.” “Without women,” says Castiglione, “nothing is possible—neither military courage, nor art, nor poetry, nor music, nor philosophy, nor even religion: God is only truly seen through them.” This was no new observation: Solomon had already said the same thing; but we must believe there were new conclusions to be drawn from it, since men hoped to find in it the answer to that vexed question of happiness which has been put in vain since the foundation of the world. To realise how women transformed themselves, we must follow their example and open our minds. They had the courage so to do: they looked life fairly in the face—with their woman’s eyes, it is true, fine, subtle, and complex; they looked, and often they did not really understand their own impressions, vivid, and rather strong than clearly defined. Often, also, under the impulse of these impressions, they acted in the genuine woman’s way, with tricks and reservations, evading the consequences of their own theories, going round the obstacle they advanced to attack in front. Their achievements and thoughts are difficult to determine. We cannot here, as in an ordinary history, be satisfied with a mere string of facts; we must play the chemist, analyse these various and complex elements, and seek to evolve a general formula. That formula is this: to live, that is, to love life, to attain a mastery of life without allowing it to crush or dominate us. The attainment of this result is well worth the trouble of deciphering a few women’s hearts, even though the handwriting should be less clear than our ordinary manuscripts. In those days they sincerely studied to love life; they loved it, rejecting all negations and obstructions, all that overwhelms and paralyses, scouting death itself! Instead of yielding to scepticism in regard to things, they wished to push love to the stage of Stoicism, to lift the heaviest burdens, to gaze upon the star of consolation which speaks to us of love eternal.