Loveability

“Of the two,” says this lady, “I would have my fair countrywomen loveable rather than wise.” As this is a matter in which the whole sex are concerned, I must beg leave to protest against setting loveability in opposition to wisdom. The happiness of a woman is so much in the power of her affections, that to be loveable is of the first importance to her.

In one respect, besides the greater regard which I retain for “words,” my sequestered unlegal, i. e. unlaw-mingled life (a terrible compound epithet that, I must own) has given me an advantage over you in keeping alive my tendency to see loveabilities in people, and thus to add to my stock of comforts; for I do not the less love old friends—quite the contrary—for when good-heartedness survives all trials and exacerbations, where can loveability be so well proved?

For Hester’s loveability as a heroine arises from the fact that she both embraces and defies her censure, managing not to sidestep what she has done and the meaning of this for others, but to make out of it her own story.