vine, all of which make him fit for contemplation and speculation, so in recompense woman is given bodily beauty that she may be superior to man in this respect" (20). Camden characterizes as "eminent practicality" the widely held Elizabethan belief that "natural beauty must be nurtured and cared for to the fullest extent," which especially in the case of high-born women "gives more time for high thoughts and honorable imaginations" (20). The whole question of high thoughts, however, must be understood in connection with Elizabethan social realities. That is, high thoughts were on the whole something that men had and that women on the whole inspired. In this regard, Austern reviews the relationship between Elizabethan views of femininity and the utility of music, noting that, among non-Puritans, women of musical accomplishment were held to have the ability to inspire physical and spiritual love (422-3). The more severe Puritan sensibility, says Austern, deplored the combination of music and beauty as potentially inflamm
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