How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Book.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #10
Lydgate thought that after all his wild mistakes and absurd credulity, he had found perfect womanhood – felt as if already breathed upon by exquisite wedded affection such as would be bestowed by an accomplished creature who venerated his high musings and momentous labours and would never interfere with them; who would create order in the home and accounts with still magic, yet keep her fingers ready to touch the lute and transform life into romance at any moment; who was instructed to the true womanly limit and not a hair's-breadth beyond – docile, therefore, and ready to carry out behests which came from beyond that limit. (4.36.71)
This passage shows just how delusional Lydgate is when he's contemplating his future wedded bliss with Rosamond – he idealizes her, and thinks only about how she'll make his life perfect, without considering the whole thing from her point of view. Like Rosamond, Lydgate's fantasy is inspired by the romances he's read. He expects Rosamond to be like an ideal fairy princess, who will somehow transform the mundane and everyday "home and accounts" into fairy land through her "romance" and "still magic." Notice, though, that his fantasy doesn't include Rosamond's having a personality or desires of her own beyond making his life easier.
Quote #11
Lydgate relied much on the psychological difference between what for the sake of variety I will call goose and gander: especially on the innate submissiveness of the goose as beautifully corresponding to the strength of the gander. (4.36.100)
Lydgate's fantasy is based partly on romance, but also partly on his observations in the natural world – on the natural difference in strength between male and female. He assumes (incorrectly) that since females are less strong than males, they are therefore proportionally more docile and submissive. That's just bad science, right there.
Quote #12
However slight the terrestrial intercourse between Dante and Beatrice or Petrarch and Laura, time changes the proportion of things, and in later days it is preferable to have fewer sonnets and more conversation. (4.37.18)
Here's another place where the narrator jumps from the particular experiences of her characters to universal statements about everyone who lives "in later days." In this case, she alludes to two famous poets: Dante and Petrarch. Both of these Italian poets were famous for writing love poetry to idealized, distant women (named Beatrice and Laura, obviously). Both poets express their despair of ever being with the woman in question, and both poets set the object of their affection on a pedestal and make her seem like she's something more than human. This passage comes in a chapter in which Will Ladislaw is despairing of ever seeing Dorothea again. The narrator says that distant, idealized love is all very well in poetry, but that "in later days" it's more important to a relationship to have rational "conversation" than sonnets.