A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Dinah
DINAH,
The only daughter of the patriarch Jacob. Her seduction by Prince Shechem; his honourable proposal of repairing the injury by marriage, and the prevention of the fulfilment of this just intention by the treachery and barbarity of her bloody brethren Simeon and Levi, are recorded in Genesis xxxiv. But every character in the Bible has its mission as an example or a warning, and Dinah's should be the beacon to warn the young of her sex against levity of manners and eagerness for society. "She went out to see the daughters of the land;" the result of her visit was her own ruin, and involving two of her brothers in such deeds of revenge, as brought a curse upon them and their posterity. And thus the idle curiosity or weak vanity of those women who are always seeking excitement and amusement, may end most fatally for themselves, and those nearest connected and best beloved. Dinah lived B. C. 1732.