MEANS OF ESCAPE ALREADY IN OPERATION.
Three effective means by which the desired change may be accomplished
are, first, that women meet regularly for the purpose of discussing
such matters as especially affect them and their mission; second, that
they have a paper for this same object; third, that representative
women from different sections of the country come together
occasionally, and compare views on these matters. Such means we
already have in the "Woman's Club," the "Woman's Journal," and the
"Woman's Congress."
The first of these institutions is not what the uninitiated, judging
from its name, might suppose. The writer, though not a club-member,
can affirm of her own knowledge, that at the weekly gatherings
questions are discussed which have a direct bearing on the interests
of the family and household. From these gatherings, members return to
their homes strengthened, refreshed, enlightened. All teachers can
testify that from teachers' conventions they go back to work with
awakened interest, fresh zeal, and with newly-acquired ideas. The
contact of mind with mind has invigorated them. They have all taken
from each other, yet none have been losers, but all have been gainers.
Every school which lost its teacher for a season gained tenfold by
that teacher's absence. So it is with the club meetings. Women leave
their homes to consider how the standard of those homes may be raised.
I happened to be present once when the discussion was upon "The amount
and kind of obedience to be exacted from children;" and I said to
myself, Now, this seems the right thing exactly. How natural, how
sensible, for women to meet and confer on such subjects as this, each
one bringing her perplexities or her suggestions; the old giving their
experience, the young profiting thereby! What better could mothers do
for their children than thus to meet occasionally and hold counsel
together?
Still people in general do not take this view of the case. People in
general are satisfied if a mother is bodily present with her children,
and do not trouble themselves as to her enlightenment.
Look at the last Woman's Congress, side by side with three other large
conventions held in this country not so very long ago, and compare its
purposes with theirs. The questions which occupied the members of one
of the three related chiefly to articles of belief, and to those
particular articles of belief in which they all believed. It was
stated beforehand, that the great object to be attained was unity, and
that no subjects would come up which, by calling out opposing
opinions, might mar the harmony of the occasion.
Another convention occupied much of its time in deciding whether those
of the denomination who sit at communion with others of the
denomination who have sat at communion with a person who has not been
wholly immersed, shall be fellowshipped by the denomination.
An enthusiastic member of still another convention publishes a long
and glowing account of its proceedings, in which account occurs the
following curious paragraph:--
"During the discussions in convention, the presentation of petitions
and memorials and drafts of canons, the reports of the committees on
canons, the amendments and substitutes, the transit of canons back and
forth between the two houses, and finally, the conference committee,
the slowly developing action of the convention was under such
confusion and cloud, that it was and may yet be difficult for many,
especially those at a distance, to make up their mind as to what
finally took place." The object of this paragraph was to account for
some wrong impressions made by the published reports.
I submit that what humanity wants to know is, how to live rightly, and
that it is suffering for this knowledge. It is not suffering to know
all about "altar cloths" and "eucharistic lights," and "colored
chasubles" and "the use of the viretta in worship." It is not
suffering to know if certain persons can partake of the Lord's Supper
with other certain persons who have partaken with other certain
persons. It is not suffering to know that a large number of
individuals believe exactly alike, and exactly as did their ancestors.
How are all these agreements and disagreements to help a poor fellow
who has inherited certain proclivities, and wishes to be rid of them,
and that his children may overmaster them?
Humanity does want to know, right away, how to keep itself alive and
well and doing well. It wants brought up for consideration the wrongs
which oppress it, the evils which defile it, the crimes which degrade
it; to have their causes investigated, and their remedies suggested.
This is live work; and it is such work as this which occupied the
attention of the Woman's Congress. No uncertain sound there. Those "at
a distance," those at the very antipodes, might "make up their mind"
that its members were asking themselves, what have we, as wives and
mothers, to do with these things? While other conventions are
"agreeing," and "fellowshipping," and wrangling over "altar cloths,"
and "virettas," the Woman's Congress considers matters which have an
immediate practical bearing on the welfare of human beings. While the
community is working away at the surface, with its prisons, its
police, its hangmen, its societies for the suppression of vice, its
schools for reform, its homes for the fallen (no doubt often with good
results), the Woman's Congress strikes at the foundation, and by
pointing out "The Influence of Literature upon Crime," and the telling
effect of "Pre-natal Influences," suggests how vice may be prevented,
character right-formed, and humanity kept from falling. It inquires,
"How can Woman best oppose Intemperance?" It considers those two vast
underlying subjects, "The Education of Women," and "The Physical
Education of our Girls;" while it by no means overlooks those
unfortunates whom society sets apart, and labels "fallen women."
In regard to our problem, if any light has been thrown, if, "the word"
has been guessed, I should say "the word" is
"enlightenment,"--enlightenment of the community as to the requirements
of woman's mission, enlightenment of woman herself as a preparation
for that mission. What say you, friends? Shall our women receive
such enlightenment? and shall it come in to the finishing or
supplementary part of their education (so called)?
True, this will cause innovations; but is it _therefore_
objectionable? No one will call our present system of education a
perfect one; why, then, should there not be innovations? "Why,
indeed," asks a writer in "The Atlantic," "except that the training of
their children is the last thing about which parents and communities
will exert themselves to vigorous thought and independent action? No
more striking proof of the inertia of the human mind can be found," he
says, "than the fact... that for many generations the true philosophy
of teaching has had its prophets and apostles, and yet that
substantially we are training our children in the same old blundering
way." The fault of this "old blundering way," it seems to me, is its
one-sidedness. It educates only the intellect. Is this the right way?
Surely the moral nature is also educable. Indeed, if the mind is
trained to act energetically, so much more should the moral sense be
trained to control the workings of that mind. Then, since the world,
we hope, is outgrowing battles, why is it considered _essential_
that we inform ourselves so particularly, so minutely, so
statistically, concerning battles fought so long, long, long ago? Does
the process hasten on the time of beating swords into ploughshares?
Suppose each generation, as it comes on to the stage, does inform
itself thus minutely: what, in the long-run, does humanity gain
thereby?
But these considerations open up subjects too vast and too important
to be even mentioned in these closing chapters. Will not you who know
the inevitable influence of the mother upon her children,--will you
not see to it that some portion of the time devoted to her education
is spent in preparing her for her life-work? Can you think of any
surer way than this by which good citizens may be raised up for our
country? Wickedness abounds. It is omnipresent. Every day,--yes, twice
a day,--the newspapers bring us tidings of corruption, fraud, villany,
not only in low places, but in high places; in exceedingly high
places. Crime is on the increase. Public officials, supported and
trusted by the people, hesitate not to defraud the people. Individuals
in good and regular standing socially and religiously, church-members,
sabbath-school teachers, defraud their nearest friends.
Nobody can tell whom to trust. If, then, neither church, nor state,
nor social position, nor any outside influence, has power to make men
honest, where shall we look for such power? We must look to an inside
influence. The restraining power, in order to be effective in all
cases, must proceed from the character of the individual; and the
character of the individual is formed to a very great degree by early
training; and early training comes from--women. So here we are again
down to our working ground.
Let us hope that innovations will be made. Let us hope that at no
distant day it will be thought as important for a young person to be
made a good member of society as to be able to cipher in the "rule of
three," in "alligation medial" and "alligation alternate." A recent
writer, a professor in the University of Pennsylvania, urges "the
importance of incorporating into our public school systems such
studies and such training as will tend to educate men for their place
in the body politic." He says, "A line of teaching which concerns
matters of more importance to society than all the ordinary branches
of knowledge put together is allowed to have no formal provision made
for it." This writer recommends the study of biographies. In Locke's
system good principles were to be cared for first, intellectual
activity next, and actual knowledge last of all.
Suppose the young women of thirty years ago had been thoroughly
instructed in hygienic laws: would not the effects of such instruction
be perceptible in our present health-rates and death-rates? Let us
begin now to affect the health-rates and death-rates of thirty years
hence. And it will do no harm to instruct young men also in such
matters. Even while I am writing these pages, a State Board of Health
report comes to me, in which it is shown by facts and figures how our
death-rates are affected by ignorance,--ignorance as exhibited in the
locating, building, and ventilating of dwelling-houses, drainage,
situation of wells, planting of trees, choice of food and cooking of
the same, as well as in the management of children. Can any subjects
comprised in any school course compare in importance with these? For
humanity's sake, let our young people take time enough from their
geographies and Latin dictionaries to learn how to keep themselves
alive! It is possible too, that, if the young women of thirty years
ago had been enlightened on the subject of moral and mental training,
our present crime rates might be less than they are, and dishonesty
and dishonor in high places and in low places be less frequent.
Mr. Whittier tells the story of a man in a certain town, who desired
the removal of an old building--an almshouse, I think--from a certain
locality. As the quickest way of accomplishing this, he gave a man a
dollar a day on condition that this man should do nothing else but
talk from morning to night with various people on the subject of
having that building moved. And it was moved. The old building we have
to move is made up of prejudices, ignorance, settled opinions, and
firmly-established customs, and it is therefore quite time we were
beginning our work. Remember the tremendous importance of our object.
An Englishman, Lord Rosebury, in a recent address, insists on a
special preparation for the hereditary rulers who sit in Parliament;
and, if those who are to rule mind need this, how much more do they
need it who are to stamp mind, and give it its first direction! Horace
Mann shall close this chapter with one of his impressive sentences.
Says this truly great man, "If we fasten our eyes upon the effects
which education may throw forward into immortal destinies, it is then
that we are awed, amazed, overpowered, by the thought that we have
been placed in a system where the soul's eternal flight may be made
higher or lower by those who plume its tender wings, and direct its
early course. Such is the magnitude, the transcendence, of this
subject."