How to Be Good: Bad Advice From Eighteenth- Century Conduct Books

by Tabitha Kenlon, Ph.D.

In Fanny Burney’s 1778 novel Evelina, the eponymous heroine writes letters to friends and family detailing the balls and parties she attends and the people she meets there, providing both an entertaining record of eighteenth-century society and a certainty that young ladies of ages past would be quite at home on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. They would use the platforms to show off their accomplishments— dancing, painting, needlework, musical ability, even foreign languages, perhaps lip-syncing to the latest Reggaeton hit. And regardless of the century, their elders would tell them they were wasting their time and suggest they devote their energy to more useful occupations.

It does seem that one of the most enduring human characteristics is the desire to tell people what to do, and especially women. In the eighteenth century, conduct manuals remained a favorite method for the creation and perpetuation of ideals of appropriate female activity; while there are few twenty-first-century versions of books like Sermons to Young Women (James Fordyce, 1766) or Strictures on the Modern System of Female Education (Hannah More, 1799), present-day society is no less eager to advise and control the behavior of women.

Ever since conduct books first appeared in the late fourteenth century, the genre has evolved and been adapted to suit changing social expectations. Conduct manuals could be collections of cautionary tales, sets of instructions, sermons, letters, or conversations. They were written by both men and women, and though they originally addressed primarily men, women quickly became their preferred audience. The books were often organized by virtue and vice: the importance of humility, piety, chastity, modesty, and industriousness, contrasted with the dangers of pride, affectation, ostentatious dress, being too forward, reading too much, talking too much—too much of almost anything, really. Authors also liked to focus on women’s

roles in life, setting out how-to’s from cradle to grave: how to be a good daughter, sister, friend, and wife, mother, and widow, or old maid. By the eighteenth century, with increased literacy and a booming print culture, many books included discussions of education, accomplishments, and what reading was suitable for young women (spoiler—almost nothing; even the Bible was fraught with danger). Most authors acknowledged that women went out into society and Figure 1. The Mirror of the Graces; or The English Lady’s Costume spoke to men, though this was (1811). rarely encouraged, necessitating warnings against flirting, trying to be funny, or appearing too intelligent. After the eighteenth century, the conduct book continued to evolve. Despite the Victorian glorification of motherhood, interest in what was happening outside the home increased. The nineteenth century turned attention to etiquette and how women should behave on trains, in hotels and restaurants, and at public events like weddings, christenings, and funerals. Twentieth-century iterations of conduct manuals tend to be divided by subject and often blur the line between self-help and etiquette. Dating guides proliferate, as does advice on relationships in general, beauty, career, travel, and finance. Unlike the vast majority of conduct books, the more recent contributions to the genre tend to separate religious and secular, imitating the society they address. Women’s Brains: A Necessary Inconvenience Writers of eighteenth-century conduct manuals took it for obvious fact that “Nature” had endowed all women with beauty, charm, a desire to please, and some degree of intelligence. There were, however, carefully delineated limits to the scope and approved uses of that intelligence. Young women were permitted to read improving books and encouraged to avoid frivolities like the novel, which, like romance novels and films of today, were

In a sense, reading eighteenth-century conduct manuals shows us more about our present than the past. In these accounts of how women were supposed to act, we can trace a through-line to current expectations—and resistance.

Figure 2. Elizabeth Easton, Needlepoint sampler, 1795.

sure to give audiences misleading portraits of life and love. James Fordyce, in the aforementioned Sermons to Young Women (1766), characterizes novelists’ descriptions of love as “loose and luscious,” likely to “engender notions of love unspeakably perverting and inflammatory.” He is warning here against the extremes of emotion that reading might excite; it is difficult to be meek, modest, and chaste when one’s pulse is racing.

If novels were verboten, what then should a young lady read? What should she learn? Such questions were a favorite topic of debate, and traditional conduct books typically presented conservative recommendations for female education, often focusing on moral rectitude rather than the acquisition of knowledge. Hester Chapone tried a combination, advocating an extensive familiarity with history, from antiquity to the present. In Letters on the Improvement of the Mind, Addressed to a Young Lady (1773/1793), she recommends talking about history with friends to better remember the facts, and is of the opinion that “it is thought a shameful degree of ignorance, even in our sex, to be unacquainted with the nature and revolutions of [ancient Greek and Roman] governments, and with the characters and stories of their most illustrious heroes.” Chapone encourages an in-depth study and an open mind. But she also has a moralist strain, observing of Nero that “a human creature given up to vice is infinitely below the most abject brute.” Education for young women required justification; a lesson about virtue and vice ensured that readers were learning the right things.

But subjects did matter. Pierre-Joseph Boudier de Villemert, in his apparently un-ironic The Ladies Friend (1771), cautions that “a few only” of the sciences are “within [women’s] reach,” and “the abstract sciences and knotty investigations […] might cloud their minds and blunt that keenness which constitutes a part of their excellence.” He presents science as not only too difficult for women, but also detrimental to their health.

An additional risk of educating women was the possibility that they then might frighten away the men. Dr. John Gregory, in A Father’s Legacy to his Daughters (1774), advises, “if you happen to have any learning, keep it a profound secret, especially from the men, who generally look with a jealous and malignant eye on a woman of great parts, and a cultivated understanding.” Gregory holds the party line: men are more important than women. He provides his instructions to his daughters so they will know how to be “most respectable and most amiable in the eyes of my own sex.” Everything a woman does, or does not do, should be weighed against the affect it will have on men. It seems that, at least in the eighteenth century, male egos require a great deal of coddling. But an additional fear among these writers is that education will distract a woman from her true purpose—marriage and children—either by rendering her unappealing to men or by diminishing her own interest in the role she was destined for. If a woman’s sole purpose was to marry and raise children, then all her energy ought to be on men, not on her own mind.

Wife Lessons

If a woman had one job—“wife and mother” was a package deal—and arranged marriages were no longer common, conduct manuals had to devote chapters to the discomfiting ritual of courtship. The concept of dating did not exist; young men and women would meet at carefully monitored social situations, be introduced, perhaps dance, and converse on tasteful topics. A woman who let a man know she liked him was a coquette. A woman who liked more than one man was a coquette. A woman who— well, you get the idea. Although women were generally told to be passive, they were reassured that the power of refusal was theirs; according to Mary Cockle’s Important Studies for the Female Sex (1809), “The privilege of man is to select—that of woman to accept or reject.” Conduct manuals cautioned women against declaring their preference for a man before he had made his feelings known; Gregory believed a woman need never reveal the extent of her love for a man, even if she married him, arguing that her acceptance of his offer of marriage was proof enough. While this line of thinking

demonstrates society’s belief that women had control over their marital prospects, the confidence is misplaced. Indeed, a woman might be permitted to say no to a man, but if a husband was her best hope for financial stability, her options remained limited.

Regardless of the depth of a woman’s feelings for her husband, conduct books told women that a key part of the job description of “wife” was being a civilizing influence and creating an atmosphere at home that would keep men on their best behavior. Boudier de Villemert declared, “Man, as destined for deeds of strength and courage, has a roughness in his temper, which women alone can soften: there is [...] a sweetness capable of molifying [sic] that natural impetuosity, which, without such a connection, would quickly degenerate into ferocity.” This is a reversal in thinking, as innumerable conduct manuals of previous centuries portray women as dangers for men to avoid, shrews for men to tame, temptations for men to resist. While women might be grateful to no longer be thought of as the root of all evil, the new role is little better, as they continue to be held responsible for men’s actions. Before, if a man misbehaved, he could blame a woman for leading him astray. Now, if a man misbehaved, he could blame a woman for not keeping him happy and civilized enough.

Some writers argued that a woman couldn’t be a good influence on her husband if her education was inadequate—an educated woman would be a better wife and mother. An anonymous writer published in The Matrimonial Preceptor (1797) complained that the “accomplishments” young women were taught (reading, writing, singing, dancing, and needlework) did not prepare them for the career of being a good wife; is it any surprise, he asks, “that a person thus brought up, should be so unfit for the conversation of a man of sense, for the partner of his joys and cares, or to share with him in the government of his family?” Conduct books promoted education only as a form of up-skilling that would better equip women to be companions to their husbands and teachers of their children.

The word “education,” though, was often applied broadly and could mean anything from academic studies to needlework and dancing to religious instruction. The Mirror of the Graces (1811), which is primarily a guide to correct fashion and manners, encourages modesty and virtue, explaining, “We may safely teach a well-educated girl that virtue ought to wear an inviting aspect […] But we must never cease to remember that it is virtue we seek to adorn.” Clearly, the “well-educated girl” here has been taught all about the female virtues; whether she knows anything about history or science is beside the point.

Be a Woman

We seem to have gone in a circle, haven’t we? From what young women ought to read, all the way to how any education they receive should prepare them to be good wives and mothers. That is because for conduct book writers (and much of society), all roads women travel on ought to lead to marriage. Gregory speaks for almost every conduct manual when he declares his purpose is to explain what makes a woman attractive to a man. But we must remember, when we read conduct manuals, that they are aspirational texts—they are records not of reality, but of desire. If women were doing what they were supposed to be doing, the books would be redundant. Rather, moralists looked around them and saw decreasing parental influence in their children’s choice of marriage partner; women publishing novels, plays, and poems; and actresses becoming celebrities whose affairs with noblemen and royalty were on display in the newspapers. With society in such decline, the pen must be taken up to remind young women of their sacred duty and destiny to become virtuous wives and mothers. Some of them did, and some of them didn’t.

In a sense, reading eighteenth-century conduct manuals shows us more about our present than the past. In these accounts of how women were supposed to act, we can trace a through-line to current expectations—and resistance. We still have books telling women how to catch a man, but we also have books about the pleasures of solitude and independence, the value of strong friendships, and how “bad girls” have broken rules and changed the world. So we can all of us read conduct manuals past and present, accept or reject the advice they offer, and continue to discover and redefine what it means to be a woman.

Figure 3. Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Young Girl Reading, ca. 1769 National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Dr. Tabitha Kenlon has published widely on conduct manuals and other genres of eighteenth-century literature. Her book, Conduct Books and the History of the Ideal Woman, examines seven centuries of rules about women’s behavior and is available as an audio book (Blackstone, 2021) and an e-book (Anthem Press, 2020). She would like to thank members of the Women’s Studies Group 1558–1837 for their generous assistance finding the images in this article, and the American Council of the Blind’s 18th-Century Reading Group, especially Amy, Chanelle, Irene, Jeanette, and Peggy, for keeping literature alive during a difficult time.