People
Let this great maxim be my virtue's guide,-- In part she is to blame that has been tried: He comes too near that comes to be denied.
— Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Behind the line May contain spoilers.
Our reading
An editorial interpretation.
The speaker proposes guarding virtue by preventing an approach that would need to be refused. The line that partly blames a woman for being tried expresses the poem's restrictive maxim; it does not make unwanted advances her fault.
- Bartlett, Familiar Quotations (1891)The Lady's ResolveReference checked
Context reviewed