Although a girl of high moral principles, she was not innocent. Are
there any such? Innocence is, of necessity, the sister of ignorance.
The conditions of modern existence render it impossible for any girl,
once she has attained the age of fifteen, to continue unacquainted
with the main facts of life, and some are initiated at an even
tenderer age. How is it possible for any maiden to remain
unenlightened in this regard these days when sensational, muck-raking
prints throw the searchlight of publicity into every boudoir and spicy
details of society's philandering fill column after column in the
breakfast table newspaper? No matter how little curiosity a
healthy-minded girl may have, by reason of a natural coldness of
temperament, to acquire such knowledge, it becomes, in spite of her,
part of her daily surroundings and she cannot escape its
contaminating, demoralizing influence.
Virginia was no fool. Now nearly nineteen, she knew everything about
life which an intelligent girl should know. What puzzled her most was
to determine her own mental attitude towards marriage. Not yet having
met a man for whom she could feel any especial regard, the idea of
forming with any man as close an association as marriage would mean
was repellent to her. The intimate relation the marital tie
pre-supposes frightened and appalled her as it has done many times
before thousands of passionless, strongly intellectual women who,
bringing cold analysis to bear on the sexual instinct, rebel at the
subordinate, humiliating role which the weaker sex is called upon to
play in Nature's vast and wonderfully complex scheme.
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