Page:Wilde - A Woman of no Importance, 1909.djvu/78

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A WOMAN OF

ACT II.

MRS. ALLONBY
Do you know, Lady Caroline, I don't think the frivolity of the wife has ever anything to do with it. More marriages are ruined nowadays by the common sense of the husband than by anything else. How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly rational being?

LADY HUNSTANTON
My dear!

MRS. ALLONBY
Man, poor, awkward, reliable, necessary man belongs to a sex that has been rational for millions and millions of years. He can't help himself. It is in his race. The History of Woman is very different. We have always been picturesque protests against the mere existence of common sense. We saw its dangers from the first.

LADY STUTFIELD

Yes, the common sense of husbands is certainly most, most trying. Do tell me

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