Age of Innocence. Edith Wharton

did not want the future Mrs Newland Archer to remain a simple, innocent girl. He intended that, with his help, she would become a social success among the married women of his circle, confident in any situation, always able to make clever and amusing conversation. If he had looked deep within himself (as he sometimes nearly did), he would have found there the wish that his wife should have the same social experience and eagerness to please as the married lady whose company he had enjoyed for two quite pleasant years.

      How this wonderful being of fire and ice was to be created, he had never taken the time to consider. He knew his views on women were shared by all the carefully dressed, buttonhole-flowered men who greeted him from their boxes or visited him in his own, and he did not see a need to think differently.