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Title: The True Woman
Author: Justin D. Fulton
Release Date: June 30, 2004 [eBook #12790]
Language: English
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THE TRUE WOMAN:
A SERIES OF DISCOURSES
BY REV. J. D. FULTON, (TREMONT TEMPLE, BOSTON.)
TO WHICH IS ADDED
WOMAN VS. BALLOT.
BOSTON, 1869
TO
THE TRUE WOMAN,
WHO, THROUGH CHRIST, BLESSES MAN, AND HELPS TO MAKE HIS HOME A JOY AND
HIS LIFE A PRIVILEGE,
THIS BOOK
IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED.
PREFACE.
This book grew. Its history is very brief. The lecture entitled "Woman
_versus_ Ballot," while well received by the majority, has met with
a strong opposition from those who do not believe in the position
assigned to Woman in the Word of God. This turned the attention of
the author to the scriptural argument more and more, and resulted in
producing the impression that the effort to secure the ballot for
woman found its origin in infidelity to the Word of God and in
infidelity to woman.
In "Woman as God made Her" we saw Eve as she was brought to Adam, and
familiarized ourselves with the purposes He had in her creation, which
were chiefly embodied in the one word "_Helpmeet_." In "Woman as
a Tempter" we saw the _ideal_ woman despoiled of her glory, and
influencing the world to turn from the worship of the Creator to that
of the creature. For ages woman suffered the consequences of sin. In
Eve she lost her recognition; through Christ she regained it. The
study of the Bible has convinced the writer that the purpose of God,
in creating woman, still lives, and is to find its complete fulfilment
under the New Dispensation. We have seen that Christ--the embodiment
of all manly properties--turned his face towards and lavished his
blessings upon womanly characteristics, such as meekness, purity,
love, and humility, and that, because of His influence, woman is
invited to take her place in the church on an equality with man, to
help on the cause of truth by an illustration of those virtues which
received the glory shed upon them by the life of the Son of Man and
the Son of God.
In the work devolving upon mankind, woman has a distinct mission to
fulfil. Society owes to her love, honor, and protection. Every right,
social and religious, should be guarded. Associations calculated to
secure for her every privilege enjoyed by man, should be formed and
supported. Above all else, efforts should be made to lead her to
recognize in Christ her Saviour, for Christ in woman is her hope of
glory, her joy and strength. Said Florence Nightingale,--
"I would say to all women, Look upon your work, whether it be an
accustomed or unaccustomed work, as upon a trust confided to you. This
will keep you alike from discouragement and from presumption, from
idleness and from overtaxing of yourselves. Where God leads the way,
he has bound himself to help you _to go the way_. I would say to
all young ladies who are called to any peculiar vocation, Qualify
yourselves for it, as man does for his work. Don't think you can
undertake it otherwise.
"And again, if you are called to do a man's work, do not exact a
woman's privileges--the privileges of inaccuracy, of weakness, of the
muddle-head. Submit yourselves to the rules of business, as men do, by
which alone you can make God's business succeed. For he has never said
that he will give his blessing to sketchy, unfinished work. And I
would especially guard young ladies from fancying themselves like
Lady Superiors, with an obsequious following of disciples, if they
undertake any great work. I would only say, Work, work, in silence at
first, in silence for years. It will not be time wasted. And it is
very certain that without it you will be no worker--you will not
produce one 'perfect work,' but only a botch, in the service of God."
In the above spirit, and with a kindred desire, this volume was
written. For good or ill, for better or worse, the book is sent forth
in the hope that it may recall attention to the Divine IDEAL for
Woman, and aid in inducing man, to prize her as the first gift of God
to him, designed "as a helpmeet for him."
CONTENTS.
WOMAN AS GOD MADE HER
Man's Faith in a Helper suited to him
Woman Man's Complement
What Man desires to have loved
Woman is God's Gift to Man
What the Fact implies:--
1. The Father's Right to give away the Child
2. The Purpose for which God created her
WOMAN A HELPMEET
Man's Longing for Companionship
Meaning of the Word Woman
Woman dislikes to give a Reason for her Faith
Requisites to Companionship
Count Zinzendorf's Tribute to his Wife
Irving's Description of a Wife
The Advantages derived from Culture
Mrs. Thomas Carlyle and others
Why the Ballot injures Woman
WOMAN AS A TEMPTER
Satan undermines Woman's Confidence in God
Satan raises Suspicion
Ritualism the Outgrowth
Mother Superior and Sisters of Charity
Satan employs Mystery
Spiritualism
Satan's Influence deceived Woman
The Girl of the Period
Woman's Peril and her Hope
The Effects of Sin
Characteristics of Woman's Power as a Tempter
Influence of Married Women
How Rome uses Woman
The Remedy
THE GLORY OF MOTHERHOOD
Woman's Hope of Triumph
Man's Destiny and Mission
Woman ignored in Eve
Woman recognized in Mary
Woman in Nestoria and the East
Trials of Motherhood
The Glory of Motherhood
MARIOLATRY NOT OF CHRIST
The Worship of the Virgin Mary
Woman's Position previous to the Advent
The Place she fills in the Scheme of Redemption
The Influences set in Motion by the Life of Christ
Christ's personal Relations to Mary reviewed
A Lesson for Woman
Peril arising from Perversions of Truth
Mary's Glory
WOMAN'S WORK AND WOMAN'S MISSION
Woman's Work and Mission go hand in hand
Love lightens Labor
Woman's Work a Work of Charity
Cause of Trouble with Servants
Education must fit Woman for the Home
Woman's Mission inferred from the Wants of Man
A proper Conception of the Truth a Help to Woman
Woman's Mission social as well as domestic
Woman's Help needed in the Cause of Reform
Woman needs Help
A Mother's Power--her Mission religious
The Value of her Sympathy
Woman's Power a Glory and a Joy
WOMAN vs. BALLOT,
Three Facts which stand in the Way of Woman's being
helped by the Ballot--God, Nature, and Common
Sense
The Scriptural Argument
God's Care for Woman
Her Condition in other Countries
An Illustration of Woman's Nature
Teachings of Nature
Teachings of Common Sense
Gail Hamilton vs. Ballot
Woman not a Lawmaker
Education essential for her
Woman not in Captivity
WOMAN AS GOD MADE HER.
The biography of our first parents, as God made them, and described
them, before sin ruined them, is very brief and truly suggestive. It
is as follows:--
"And Jehovah God created the man in his image; in the image of God
created he him; a male and a female created he them. And God blessed
them; and God said to them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the
earth, and subdue it, and rule over the fish of the sea, and over the
fowl of the heavens, and over every living thing that moves on the
earth. And God said, Behold, I have given to you every herb scattering
seed, which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree, in
which is the fruit of a tree scattering seed, to you it shall be
given."--Gen. i. 27-30.
"And Jehovah God formed the man of the dust of the ground, and he
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a
living soul. And Jehovah God planted a garden in Eden, on the east,
and there he put the man whom he formed, ... to till it and to keep
it. And God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden
thou mayest freely eat. But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil
thou shalt not eat of it, for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou
shalt surely die. And God said, It is not good that the man should be
alone. I will make for him a helper, suited to him. And God caused a
deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; and he took one of his
ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place. And of this rib which he
took from the man, Jehovah God formed a woman, and brought her to the
man. And the man said, This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my
flesh. This shall be called Woman, because from man was she taken.
Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall
cleave to his wife; and they shall be one flesh. And they were both
naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."--Gen, ii. 7, 8,
15-18, 21-25.
Brief as are these utterances, and familiar as is this language, it is
interesting to notice that God has crowded into them every essential
fact concerning the origin of woman, the purpose of her creation, and
the sphere marked out for her by the Creator's hand.
The simple outline of the story is given us, yet how wonderful is the
picture! In the first chapter the origin of man is proclaimed, and
his work, "to fill earth and subdue it," is placed before him. In the
second chapter, the relation of the sexes is given, and the nature of
marriage is explained. What arrests the attention most surely is the
resemblance that exists between the experience of our first parents
and of their descendants, or between Adam and Eve and ourselves. The
"It is not good for man to be alone," spoken by God in Eden, embodies
a truth which has lived with the ages, and sets forth an experience
felt by every son of Adam. The words "I will make for him a helper
suited to him," is man's authority for the faith, that somewhere on
the earth God has made a helper suited to him, whom he will recognize,
and who will return the recognition. For in all true marriages, now as
in Eden, the man and woman do not deliberately seek, but are brought
to one another. Happy those who afterwards can recognize that the hand
which led his Eve to Adam was that of an invisible God. Man knows that
it is not good for him to be alone. Separated from woman's influence,
man is narrow, churlish, brutal. Woman is a helper suited to him. With
her help he reaches a loftier stature; for love is the very heart of
life, the pivot upon which its whole machinery turns, without which no
human existence can be complete, and with which it becomes noble and
self-sacrificing.
Woman's origin is thus declared:--
"And Jehovah God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he
slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its
place. And of the rib which he took from the man God formed a woman,
and brought her to the man. And the man said, This now is bone of my
bones, and flesh of my flesh. This shall be called Woman, because from
man was she taken. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his
mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall be one flesh."[A]
_Woman was taken out of man_. It is man's nature to seek to get her
back. He feels that a part of _him_ is away from him, until he obtains
her. Long years before he sees the woman whom he feels God designed to
be his wife, if he be a Christian, believing that she is on the earth,
he prays for her weal.
[Footnote A: Gen. ii. 21-24.]
"_Taken out of man!_" How significant these words! Man, without woman,
wants completeness--physically, mentally, and spiritually. First,
physically. The fact is noticeable that short men often marry tall
women, and tall men marry short women. Nervous men marry women who are
opposites to them in temperament. This is not a happen so, for that
which so often to the unreflecting mind seems unnatural and absurd,
to the thinking soul appears as an evidence of God's provident care.
Second, mentally. Man desires in his wife that which he lacks. A
bookish man seldom desires a wife devoted to the same branch of
literature, unless she works as a helpmeet. In taste and in sentiment
there must be harmony without rivalry. They must bring products to
the common garner, gathered from varying pursuits and from different
fields of thought. In music the same law rules. Man, from his very
nature, finds in woman a helper in song. Their voices blend in
harmony, and give volume, symphony, and variety to the melody
produced. Jenny Lind married her assistant, because in sympathy they
were one. He was essential to her womanly strength, and without her,
he was a mere cipher in the musical world. Together they were a power,
felt and acknowledged.
A man full of thought and of genius requires for a wife, not only one
who can understand his moods and enjoy his creations, but one who is
content to take care of the home, and, perhaps, to manage the business
affairs; while many a woman of genius and ability links her fortunes
with a plain and appreciative husband, who gladly affords her every
means in his power to work in her special sphere. When the wife
refuses to act thus wifely, because of her talent, the happiness
of the home is imperilled, and the children suffer quite as much,
comparatively, as they do in those manufacturing neighborhoods where
the wife forsakes the home for the shop, and gives up the vocation
of woman to do the work which belongs to man. God made them male and
female. He fitted each for separate duties, not for the same duties.
Each fills a sphere when each discharges the duties enjoined upon them
by their Creator and by society. Wonderful women there are; few of
them care to duplicate their power. They prefer to obtain by marriage
that which they have not, and which must be supplied by material from
without. Homely people oftentimes find beautiful ones to mate them.
The rugged seeks the weak. The nervous, the lymphatic. Counterpart
that which makes itself complete. This tendency to assimilate is
often carried to extremes, because all naturally love that which they
possess, and come to prize highly those who regard it with favor.
Hence, poor men sometimes marry rich wives, and seldom fail to give
something in return. The story is familiar of the two foppish young
men who were said to have met at a noted hotel or on change, when one
accosted the other by the question, "Who did you marry?" "Ah," said
he, "I married fifty thousand dollars. I forget her other name."
Such men, however, are exceptions to the rule. There are brainless
creatures called men, who will marry a pretty face, though the heart
and brain be uncultured, provided there be associated with her
sufficient of this world's goods to gratify a mercenary ambition; but
the majority, both of men and women, wisely prefer to marry money in
a partner rather than money with a partner. The world has a profound
contempt for shallow, fussy, empty people, no matter what positions
they may occupy.
All sympathize with the rebuke administered to a so-called lady of
quality by a Quaker gentleman, who occupied a seat near her in a
public coach. She wore an elegant lace shawl, and was dressed to the
top of the fashion, but was suffering from the cold. Shivering and
shaking, she inquired, "What shall I do to get warm?" "_Thee had
better put on another breastpin_," answered old Broadbrim. The rebuke
was timely. Woman degrades herself when she surrenders to fashion that
which helps the woman, and which aids her in securing the confidence,
the friendship, the respect, and admiration of sensible men.
The truth embodied in the words, "This shall be called Woman, because
_from man was she taken_" sheds light upon many a mysterious chapter
in life, reconciles the union of contraries in accordance with the law
of God, and fills wide realms of life with the radiance of hope, which
otherwise would remain mantled in perpetual gloom. If we depended upon
those who are like ourselves to sympathize with us, and gird us with
strength, we should utterly fail. Oaks cannot lend support to oaks.
The vine can do this for the oak, and the oak can give support to the
vine; but an oak cannot give strength to its kindred while fulfilling
the functions of its life. The same law rules in the mental world.
Genius seldom applauds genius, working in its own realm. Very likely
it loathes it. The tributes paid to labor are given by the soft-handed
rather than by the hard-handed sons of toil. This principle lies back
of the appreciation, the commendation, and the support rendered by the
different classes of a community to each other.
The God-given and Christ-restored thought of equality between the
sexes is seen in the household partnership, where the woman looks for
a "smart, but kind" husband, the man for a "capable, sweet-tempered"
wife. The man furnishes the house, the woman regulates it. Their
relation is one of mutual esteem, mutual dependence. Their talk is of
business; their affection shows itself by practical kindness. They
know that life goes more smoothly and cheerfully to each for the
other's aid; they are grateful and content. The wife praises her
husband as a "good provider;" the husband, in return, compliments her
as a capital housekeeper. This relation is good as far as it goes;
but the heart of the man or woman is unsatisfied, if to household
partnership intellectual companionship be not added.
Men can hire their houses kept. Love cannot be purchased. Soul
communion is the gift of God. It is very often enjoyed on earth. Men
engaged in public life, literary men and artists, have often found
in their wives companions and confidants in thought, no less than in
feeling. And as the intellectual development of woman has spread
wider and risen higher, they have, not unfrequently, shared the same
employments.
Thirdly, spiritual. The highest grade of marriage union is the
spiritual, which may be expressed as a pilgrimage towards a common
shrine.
There is something in every man which he feels to be the essential
thing about him. This it is which he desires to have loved. Neglect
what else you choose, you must not neglect that. It is the spiritual
part of man,--the God-given characteristic which longs for sympathy.
Men feel that this want has been met when they say, "Such a one
understands me, knows me, sees me, is in sympathy with me." Such
moments are to all of priceless value. Whoever meets this want is a
boon from God. No matter what the complexion, nor how the features
seem: soul meets soul. The heart feels a new life. The union is
formed. _Call it affinity, or what you will_, they love in one another
the future good which they aid one another to unfold. This includes
home sympathies and household wisdom. Such fellowship makes of home a
joy, and of toil a delight. When first the joy is reached, a foretaste
of heaven is enjoyed. "For it is the one rift of heaven which makes
all heaven appear possible; the ecstasy of hope and faith, out of
which grows the love which is our strongest mortal instinct and
intimation of immortality."
Women are as conscious of this feeling as are men. There are times
when women meet their counterpart. The nature they long for and seek
after with unutterable longing, is before them. Finding it, they
recognize their lord, under whose protection they take shelter, and
to whose rule they submit, because of love which masters and controls
them. The heart cries out for a person--not for things. Spirit
desires spirit; soul yearns for soul. It is the genius of woman to be
electrical in movement, intuitive in penetration, and spiritual in
tendency. She excels not so easily in classification or recreation as
in an instinctive seizure of causes, and a simple breathing out of
what she receives, that has the singleness of life, rather than the
selecting and energizing of art. More native is it to her to be the
living model of the artist, than to set apart from herself any one
form in objective reality. More native to inspire and receive the poem
than to create it. In so far as soul is in her completely developed,
all soul is the same; but in so far as it is modified in her as
woman, it flows, it breathes, it sings, rather than deposits soil,
or furnishes work; and that which is especially feminine, flushes in
blossom the face of the earth, and pervades, like air and water, all
this seeming solid globe, daily renewing and purifying its life. Such
is the especial feminine element which man desires as a helper, and
which is suited to him, and which compels him to exclaim, "O, my God,
give it to me _for mine_!"
It is said, "A woman will sometimes idealize a very inferior man,
until her love for him exalts him into something better than he
originally was, and her into little short of an angel; but a man
almost invariably drops to the level of the woman he is in love with.
He cannot raise her; but she can almost unlimitedly deteriorate him."
This was true of Adam. Eve, sinning, brought him to her level. Why
this should be, Heaven knows; but so it constantly is. We have but
to look around us, with ordinary observation, in order to see that a
man's destiny, more than even a woman's, depends far less upon the
good or ill fortune of his wooing than upon the sort of woman with
whom he falls in love.
Before a man loves, he is under obligations to himself, to his future,
and to the world, to ask himself, Is this woman suited to me? Will she
help me to fulfil my mission? Does she supply my want? Can I recognize
her as God's gift to me? If Yes, then he is right in loving; for
"He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
Who dares not put it to the touch,
And win or lose it all."
A woman, writing of woman, has truly said, "There are but two ways
open to any woman. If she loves a man, and he does not love her, to
give him up may be a horrible pang and loss; but it cannot be termed
a sacrifice: she resigns what she never had. But if he does love her,
and she knows it, and if she loves him, she has a right, in spite of
the whole world, to hold to him till death do them part. She is bound
to marry him, though twenty other women loved him, and broke their
hearts in loving him. He is not theirs, but hers; and to have her for
his wife is his right and her duty." "And in this world are so many
contradictory views of duty and exaggerated notions of light, so many
false sacrifices and remunerations, weak even to wickedness, that
it is but fair sometimes to uphold the right of love,--love sole,
absolute, and paramount,--firmly holding its own, and submitting to
nothing and no one, except the laws of God and righteousness." Well
and truthfully spoken. Lift up this principle, and behold how it
showers benedictions upon all classes and upon all men.
Much is said against amalgamation, as though it were a crime. There is
no crime in it or about it. There is much of prejudice, but no crime.
Soul marries soul. If a white man loves the soul of a black woman,
there is no law in God's code forbidding the union. God made of one
blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth.
Complexions may differ, owing to climate, or temperament, but the
blood is the same. The race has a common Father in God.
In this intermingling of races, coming to this land from all climes,
we perceive the seedling of a glorious hope. The future American is to
be the product of this blending of the distinctive features of all the
various nations of earth.
Against this result there is an immense amount of prejudice, born
of slavery; but in Europe it does not exist, nor is it in fact so
universal in this land as many suppose. Many a white man has found his
helpmeet in a black woman, and many more will find helpmeets from the
same source.
2. "_Woman was taken out of man_." There is significance in the
locality from which she was taken. Not from the superior part, that
she might think herself superior to man, or endowed with the right to
rule him. Her sin consisted in her failing to recognize the position
assigned. She was created an associate and an equal, and acted
independently, and as an adviser. She took advantage of her position
as wife, and became an ally of Satan.
She was not taken from an inferior portion of his body, that he might
think her inferior to himself, and to be trampled on by him, but out
of his side,--from his rib,--that she might appear to be equal to him;
and from a part near his heart, and under his arm, to show that she
should be affectionately loved by him, and be always under his care
and protection.
Wherever man has failed to recognize this truth society has gone back
to barbarism, and the very conception of a home has been banished from
the mind. In the East man rules woman as lord. She is his slave; and
in the Arabic language there is no word meaning "home." Christian
civilization lifts woman up, and thrones her in the heart of a _home_.
She was made from "bone and flesh,"--quickened dust,--and so in her
make and constitution she is of superior quality and of finer mould.
The Hebrew word translated "made," means _built_. From the rib God
built this woman. How instructive the fact! Woman added to man is the
foundation of the home or family. She is built out of man. Man is
necessary to her development. A man can continue the work begun by
God. He can build up a woman; and as he builds her up he builds up
himself. She is also a builder. She builds up a home, or degrades it.
If woman is honored in a home, she makes it honorable.
At the outset she was man's equal: perhaps she may have thought
herself to be superior to him--more refined, of better material. She
forgot her place, and ignored her sphere, and lost all. She was not
created as things were, out of nothing. She was meant to be something
better than a _thing_; and she must be something better than a thing,
or she is nothing. She was not formed as Adam was, out of the dust of
the earth. Had she been, perhaps she would not have disliked dust so
terribly. She is a part of man's life. This describes her mission. The
life of a woman who does not care to be a man's toy or ornament, but
desires rather to be his helpmeet,--supplying all he needs, as he
supplies all she needs,--is but the continuance, the flowing out and
flowing on of man's higher life, into the flowers of love, which
decorate the home, and make that chosen retreat the very portals of
heaven.
As man feels that in woman he finds the complement to himself, and
almost his other self, woman finds in man the same complement to
herself, and recognizes in him the ruler of her life, her friend,
her lover; and happy is she if she finds in him her husband, who
rightfully assumes his rights and his sovereignty.
3. "_God brought her unto man_." Woman is God's first gift to man.
She must never occupy a second place. In the heart she holds a first
place, or she holds none at all. The moment she holds a secondary
place she is ruined. It is in her power to hold the first place. To do
this, she must prize it; make sacrifices to keep it; almost, at times,
deny herself, and bear a cross, to hold on to it. Yet it is hers, and
God will see to it that she maintains her right.
"_God brought her_." Every husband in this world should feel that
his wife is God's gift to him, and it is his duty to study its
characteristics, and minister to them. Every man can make the partner
of his life a good wife, and can feel that she was God-given, and must
be used in such a manner that when the day of reckoning comes, he can
give a good account of the manner in which he has used this blessing.
To go to the judgment, and meet a broken-hearted woman, over whom man
has exercised tyranny, and to whom he has been a monster, until hope
died, and the grave became a refuge, will not be a pleasant meeting.
In this bestowal of woman upon man, we recognize two facts.
1. The father's right to give away his child--a right which exerts its
influence at the present time, and which every young man who seeks
properly the hand of woman is compelled to recognize. In that act of
Eden lie the rule and example to be followed by parents and children:
the one to dispose of their children, and the other to have the
consent of their parents in reaching conclusions upon which hinges the
destiny of the individual for time, and perhaps for eternity. Happy
the child that trusts a wise parent, and refuses to walk a path over
which the shadow of parental disapproval rests! Happy the parent who
finds pleasure in the fresh young love of the child, and watches the
opening flower and the ripening fruit with pride and pleasure.
This giving away of the child requires the enjoyment of perfect
confidence between father and daughter and mother and son.
God knew Eve, for he built her. He knew her heart, her mind, her
aspiration. A parent knows something of the child; and well it is for
both parent and child when this knowledge is perfect, and when the
relation subsisting between parents and children is such that home is
a place of consultation. A home without secrets, without closed doors,
and locked drawers and sugar-boxes,--a home where thought is free, and
mind is untrammelled, is the very gate of heaven.
There are homes where the children are excluded from counsel, from
love, from plan, from association. Those children live in a world
apart from their parents, and it will not be strange if they are swept
out by the waves of evil to ruin.
There are homes where the father shuts himself away from the wife and
children. To the children he is harsh, unsympathetic, and morose. Ah!
there is sorrow in that house. The mother--God bless her!--has a hard
time. She has to keep in with the father, and she will keep in with
the children. In that bundle of life the tendrils of her nature are
bound up. She fights a prolonged battle in regard to expenditure and
education. Happiness only comes when the household is one, and the
relations between father and children are perfect, as God designed
them to be.
Again, God gives his sanction not only to the truth that man's wants
can only be met by the gift of woman,--a fact which every man has
felt, and which causes every man to feel that somewhere on earth his
wife is living, who will recognize and welcome him to the bliss of
love and to the joy of companionship,--but this additional truth is
taught: Man has a right to marry. Love is no disgrace. It is the
pretence of it, for base purposes, which is disgraceful. The nuptial
vow was first whispered in the garden. God was sponsor, and all Eden
witnesses. This bond of union was God's gift to the race. The curse
did not touch it. The marriage vow and marriage rite, with the faith
in woman as a helpmeet, have survived the fall, and are our joy and
rejoicing at this time.
In conclusion, think of God's care for man, in providing woman as a
blessing. There is no necessity for man's being alone. Some one waits
to bless or has blessed him. Let us make more of our wives and sisters
than ever before. Let us build them up in love and in those generous
qualities which fit woman for her high destiny in this fallen world.
2. Think, woman, of your noble mission. You are to be a help to man.
You are to help him morally and spiritually. For this God created you.
For this he preserves you. "You are queens and bondmaids too, as royal
when you serve as when you rule." Man must respect you, for when
man loses his respect for woman he is lost. He goes down, down to
irremediable ruin. With woman as God designed her, man gets much of
Eden back, for in Christ she is reconciled to God. It is for man and
woman to get back Eden. Christ came to be our common helper. He is
woman's Saviour as well as man's, and offers to all that help which
changes life's desert into a garden, and life's gloom into the
brilliancy of an eternal day.
"Hail, woman! Hail, thou faithful wife and mother,
The latest, choicest part of heaven's great plan.
None fills thy peerless place at home, no other
Helpmeet is found for laboring, suffering man.
Hail, thou home circle, where, at day's decline,
Her moulding power, her radiant virtues shine!
Not in the church to rule or teach, her place;
Not in the mart of trade, or senate halls;
Not the wild, festive scene is hers to grace;
Not Fashion's altar her its victim calls;
Not here her field of triumph; but alone
She moves the queen of her own quiet home."
REV. MARK TRAFTON.
WOMAN A HELPMEET.
The purpose of God in the creation of woman was to provide man with a
helpmeet. The language is unmistakable. "And the Lord God said, It is
not good that the man should be alone. I will make for him a helper
suited to him." Woman was made to be man's helpmeet in Eden; that
purpose survives the _fall_. For right or wrong, for good or ill, her
influence is felt. She lifts man up or drags him down. Scoff at it,
oppose it, cast opprobrium upon this ancient utterance, the fact
remains, woman is made for man. Helpmeet she was, helpmeet she must
be, or leave her work undone, and suffer the blight that results from
the lack of love. God placed man in the garden to keep it, and he
placed woman there to fill the bower with love, and his home with joy.
The coming of Eve to Adam is a beautiful story. He had been taught to
realize his need of her. It was a part of his constitution. The same
is true now wherever woman is appreciated. The felt want is the
recognition of the fact. A wife chosen by one's parents, not by
himself, is devoid of all of those special characteristics which
distinguish her where processes of love begin, go on, deepen and
tighten, until the bond is woven and the union formed.
"Nothing so delights man as those graceful nets,
Those thousand delicacies that daily flow
From all her words and actions, mixed with love
And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned
Union of mind, or in them both one soul."[A]
[Footnote A: Paradise Lost, Book VIII.]
The knowledge of congeniality of tastes can only be obtained by mutual
acquaintance, and by a careful study. It is said nothing is so blind
as love. Nothing is so foolish as a blind love. Man needs a helpmeet,
and woman needs a man she can help. It is possible to know before
marriage that the parties are able to fulfil this trust. If they
cannot fulfil it, marriage is a sin, which brings forth continuous
sorrow and discontent.
The purpose of God to provide a helpmeet was avowed, but Adam did not
know the fact. Under the arch of God's promise we discover the working
of God's providence. The Bible, if properly studied, is a more
thrilling narrative than any novel, because in it we can behold the
infinite God working with man and for man. "It is not good that man
should be alone." This is the general proposition. As a counterpart we
find man feeling that it was very sad to be alone. In his heart there
is a want at work, making him ready for the blessing which God is
preparing for him.
The want of the soul means a purpose on the part of God to supply
it. This is true in regard to all that vitally interests man in this
world. My want is the basis of my hope. God, who is above and around
me, would not send forward the desire unless he had purposed to grant
it.
Prayer stirring in the soul, is to man spiritually what a bill
of goods preceding the payment is to a merchant. Do we long for
salvation, for a revival, for any spiritual outpouring? have faith
in God. There is a motive in it. Expect the blessing, and you will
receive it.
"The Spirit itself," said Paul, "beareth witness with our spirit, that
we are the children of God; and if children, then heirs; heirs of God,
and joint heirs with Christ, if so be that we suffer with him, that we
may be also glorified together." This is enjoyed despite the curse.
"Jesus sent us the Comforter, who helpeth our infirmities, for we know
not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself maketh
intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And he
that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the spirit,
because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of
God. And we know that all things work together for good to them that
love God, to them who are thus called according to his purpose." This
fatherhood of God comes to us under all circumstances and in all
conditions. In the home, in the heart with all its wails, in the
battle, in the victory, on earth and in heaven. Notice how Adam was
made ready for his helpmeet.
"And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field,
and every fowl of the air, and brought them unto Adam to see what he
would call them; and whatsoever Adam called every living creature,
that was the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to
the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam
there was not found a helpmeet for him."
Imagine Adam feeling this want of companionship as the beasts of earth
in their pristine beauty pass before him. There are those who mate
with a horse or a dog. Who make a pet of a brute, and, ignoring their
higher relations, live for their lower nature. We know that animals
can be brought to do almost anything but talk, and some birds have the
gift of speech. It was doubtless true of Eden. The serpent's talking
did not surprise Eve.
Perhaps Adam may have found animals that could have kept him company.
Yet he could find none who could meet his want as a helpmeet. Milton
has fancifully described Adam expressing his want to the Infinite. It
grew upon him. Then he has pictured him asleep, and seeing, as in a
trance, the rib, with cordial spirits warm, formed and fashioned with
his hands, until
"Under his forming hands a creature grew,
Manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair
That what seemed fair in all the world seemed now
Mean, or in her summed up, in her contained,
And in her looks, which from that time infused
Sweetness into my heart unfelt before,
And into all things from her air inspired
The spirit of love and amorous delight."
Then she disappeared. The dream haunted him in his waking hours. In
the gallery of the Louvre there is a picture of Henry IV becoming
entranced by the picture of his future wife, and next to it is the
picture of the proud man being married to the woman whose face in
the picture had once captivated his fancy. Those pictures were the
realization of the one described in Milton's verse. Adam saw in Eve
the realization of his dream, and was happy when he welcomed to his
embrace this first gift of God, which met his want and answered his
prayer. God created man not only a social being but an intellectual
being. A beast can mate with beasts. They do so. A distinguished
writer says, "the family relation is almost universal among the higher
classes of animals." Adam's immortal nature longed for a kindred
spirit. One to commune with, one to love, one to guide, one to look at
life from another standpoint, one whose opinions should be diverse,
and yet alike in difference, one to help in all the affairs of life,
not only for the propagation of the species, but to provide things
useful and comfortable for him, and like himself in temper, in
disposition, and destiny. One to whom God shall be a loving Father,
and heaven a common home. One with whom soul can join with soul in
worship and love. A kindred spirit. A spirit having a common love, a
common purpose, a common aspiration, and a common interest.
This longing for companionship was the earliest recorded emotion of
the soul. It comes earliest to us and stays longest. In childhood,
very often, instinct and desire rule wisely, and matches formed in
heaven are recognized in life's morning on earth far oftener than we
are accustomed to think. This longing never ceases. The child wants
companionship, and old age, shattered and broken, feels the need of
this loving support which God provides in the opposite sex quite as
much as does the youthful heart. Our perfect humanity is made up of
the two, and is not complete without this union.
The most magnificent scenery is tame, unless you can point out its
beauties to the one you love. The picture gallery is worthless, unless
some other lip can press the goblet of your pleasure, and sip
nectar from the flower of beauty which blossoms in your thought or
imagination. It is not good for man to be alone, even in Eden. Eden is
not Eden without its Eve. Before Eve came, Eden was the pastureland of
beasts; after it, the place took on home-like properties, bowers of
love were formed, and the place became the house of God, and the gate
of heaven.
The characteristics of woman as a helpmeet deserve our notice.
1. _Consider this word "Woman._" Woman was the name given to our
mother because she was taken out of man. The word itself means
_pliant_. In this definition we discover the first characteristic of a
womanly nature. She is pliant. She adjusts herself to circumstances.
She is adapted to meet man's wants, because she finds it in her nature
to adapt herself to meet them.
It is gentlemanly to avow an opinion. We feel that it is womanly to
waive one. We never think less of a woman for not forcing her opinions
upon a company. We do not desire her to be without opinions, nor is it
expected that she will desist from expressing an opinion, but if one
must yield, it is womanly in woman to do so.
Indeed, oftentimes a woman of strong mental calibre, whose opinions
are derived from thought and study, has built her husband up by
permitting his expression to stand even though her own judgment might
differ from him. If she be a true wife or sister, she will seek, in
retirement, to correct an opinion which could not be avowed in public
without weakening a husband's or a brother's influence. A woman that
builds up another is herself a power and a praise.
The word _pliant_ does not demand an absence of quality. The Damascus
blade is pliant; it can be bent but it is not easily broken, while
its edge is the keenest and its strength is a marvel. So woman is not
necessarily weak because she is pliant. She may be the very reverse,
and yet be pliant. Oftentimes her power of control is the more potent
because it is unseen and unostentatious. An opinion held, to be
uttered in the moment of cool and calm reflection, may be more telling
than if spoken while the storm of debate was raging. The still, small
voice came after the lightning and the thunder and the earthquake, and
God spake in it with power and effect. It is the quiet utterance in
the home which is of marvellous power in the world. It is womanly to
adorn rather than to plan.
She fits herself for companionship rather than for leadership. By her
tact and by her very nature she is enabled to harmonize antagonistic
elements, and promote concord, if she cannot secure union. Like the
lily living in the water, she feeds on her native element, love. The
lily, though it floats on the wave, opens wider its leaves to the rain
and dew. So woman, though living on love, finds pleasure and rapture
in fresh manifestations of love day by day. It is her nature to love.
It is her life to be beloved.
2. Think of this other title, _feminine_. This word, in its meaning,
furnishes the second characteristic. It pertains to woman, and denotes
a soft, tender, and delicate nature. Effeminate means destitute of
manly qualities.
A woman truly feminine is thus described: "No coarseness was mingled
with her plainness of speech; no boisterousness with her zeal. Her
feelings, her sensibilities, her tastes were all characterized by a
gentleness and delicacy seldom surpassed. While her heroic daring
and unconquerable energy excited admiration, her love of birds and
flowers, and indeed of all that is beautiful in nature, made her seem
almost childlike." This characteristic, so loved and admired, is
woman's glory, and yet it is effeminate. Woman's mind is quicker, more
flexible, more elastic than man's, though the brain, in weight, is
much lighter. Man's brain weighs, on an average, three pounds and
eight ounces. Woman's brain weighs, on an average, two pounds and four
ounces. The female intellect is impregnated with the qualities of her
sensitive nature. It acts rather through a channel of electricity than
of reasoning. Its perceptions of truth come, as it were, by intuition.
It is under the influence of the heart, that has deep and unfathomable
wells of feeling; and truth is felt in every pulse, rather than
reasoned out and demonstrated. You cannot offend a woman so quick, in
any way, as to ask her why she wishes to do thus, or why she reaches
such a conclusion. Her reply is, invariably, "'_Cause!_" And that is
about all she knows about it; and yet woe be to the man who ignores
her intuitions, or treats with disdain her advice. Woman reads
character quicker and better than man. Her policy lies in her heart.
She feels rather than reasons. Man reasons rather than feels. Hence
she is a helpmeet. She fills a lack, and supplies a want.
In her the imagination and fancy have such a lively play, that the
homeliest principles assume forms of beauty. In intellectual pursuits
she is destined to excel by her fine sensibilities, her nice
observations, and exquisite tastes, while man is appointed to
investigate the laws of abstruse sciences, and perform in literature
and art the bolder flights of genius. She may surpass him in
representing life and manners, and in the composition of letters,
memoirs, and moral tales, in descriptive poetry, and in certain styles
of music and painting, and even in sculpture. But she will never write
an Iliad or a Paradise Lost, or tragedies like those of Aeschylus. She
will never rival Demosthenes in producing a political oration, nor
a massive philosophic history like Thucydides. She will not paint a
Madonna like Raphael, nor chisel an Apollo Belvedere. The logic of
Aristotle, the polemics of Augustine, the prodigious onsets of a
Luther, the Institutes of a Calvin, the Novum Organum of Bacon, the
Principia of Newton, the Cosmos of Humboldt--the like of these she
will never achieve, nor is it desirable that she should.
Women seldom invent. There are all manner of inventions, often
hundreds of applications in a single day, for patents at the Patent
Office, yet among them there are no female applicants. Woman cannot
compete with man in a long course of mental labor. The female mind is
rather quiet and timid than fiery and driving. It admires rather than
covets the great exploits of the other sex. Woman never excelled
in architecture. To her belong the gentler arts of quiet life and
retirement, where she has power to soften and refine the heart of
him who is accustomed to battle with the elements and the forces of
external nature.
We might speak at length of woman's gentle nature, present striking
examples of female submission, endurance, and heroism, and speak in
general of her charms and of her beneficent influence in domestic
and social life. It would be equally pertinent, perhaps, to exhibit
brilliant specimens of female genius and culture in the more graceful
walks of literature, science, or art. These gay flowers of humanity
lie scattered all over the vast field of history. But our subject
leads us in another direction. Woman as a helpmeet finds in her own
nature the natural introduction to the spheres of usefulness and
influence ever open to her. She has a body, a mind, and soul. She must
help, physically, mentally, and spiritually. The household partnership
is opened to her physical nature. This relation is good as far at it
goes. But it is only the beginning. It is rather the result than the
commencement of the union. There is a closer tie found in intellectual
companionship. Mind comes in contact with mind; the wants of the
intellect are met, and a union is the result. Men engaged in public
life, literary men and artists, have often found in their wives
companions and confidantes in thought no less than in feeling. And
as the intellectual development of woman has spread wider, and never
higher, they have been mutual helpers, suited to each other. Roland
and his wife in Paris, William and Mary Howitt of England, and Mr. and
Mrs. Browning, are beautiful illustrations of this principle, though
they are exceptional in their character. As a rule, when men find
helpers in women, there is no community of employment. Harmony exists
in difference no less than in likeness, if only the same key-note
governs both parts. Woman the poem, man the poet! Woman the heart, man
the head! Such instances lie all about us. Man rides to battle, while
his wife is busy in the kitchen; but difference of occupation does
not prevent that community of inward life, that perfect esteem which
causes him to say,--
"Whom God loves, to him gives he such a wife"
And yet there is a still higher realm open before woman, because of
her spiritual nature.
Woman as a helpmeet needs something besides a well-stored mind. She
requires a heart filled with pure affections. Here we perceive how
essential to her well being is submission to Christ.
The assumption of the New Testament is, that we possess an animal
nature. The meaning of the word _flesh_, in all the New Testament
writings, is, that the human family are living in an animal condition.
It is taught that in that condition it is impossible for them to
understand higher truths, or to feel higher influences, or to enter
into the experiences which belong to the full development of the
higher faculties. Christ came to us, suffered, and died for us, that
an escape from this lower into the higher realm might be possible. It
is possible. There is inherent under the divine influence the power of
recreating, so that the soul shall escape from the prison-house of the
flesh, and shall henceforth lead the mind and the body into a higher
realm of thought and action. The very nature of woman makes her
susceptible to religious impressions. Her lively imagination, her
quick sensibilities, and her ready sympathy enable her readily to
give Christ, the personification of every manly attribute and the
embodiment of every virtue, a welcome to her soul.
It is possible for woman's spiritual nature to so marry Christ, that
her physical nature can, without a great sacrifice, forego the joys of
earthly companionship. Hence some women mated with a brute of a man,
shine as Christians, and make excellent mothers. Woman as a Christian
is a helpmeet indeed and in truth. Her power as such is felt in the
church and in the world. She is peculiarly adapted to carry forward
enterprises which have to do with meliorating the condition of
society. Who is so adapted as she to manage an orphan's home, or to
minister to the sick in hospitals, or to give support and sympathy to
the aged, or to train children up in the nurture and admonition of the
Lord? The first requisite to companionship is a heart imbued with the
love of Christ. _A heart must be emphasized_, for a heartless woman
is a terror in society, but a woman with a great heart, reverent
and obedient to God, and full of love for Christ and his work, is a
benefaction to a man, to a home, to a community, and to the world.
"Favor is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman that feareth the
Lord, she shall be praised." And a woman that feareth the Lord and
serveth him, is praised and prized beyond rubies. The next requisite
to holiness may be said to be skilfulness in the home. Woman must be
trained to household duties. If she lacks here, she is wanting in much
that makes her a real wife or mother or sister.
America, the land of homes, finds the housewife essential to its
future. Housework in woman is ever honorable. It ought to be her glory
and her pride. Let us make it so more and more.
The second requisite is intelligence. A woman must keep up with man
in literature, in general news, in what interests the community, and
especially in growth in grace, and in the knowledge of the word of
God, if she would make her home attractive. Thus shall they
"Sit side by side full sunned in all their powers
Dispensing harvests;
Self-reverent each and reverencing each
Distinct in individualities;
But like each other even as those who love,
Then comes the statelier Eden back to man.
For it is possible in wedded pair a harmony
More grateful than harmonious sound to the ear."
Said Count Zinzendorf, in regard to his wife, "Twenty-five years'
experience has shown me that just the helpmeet whom I love is the
only one that could suit my vocation. Who else could have so carried
through my family affairs? Who lived so spotlessly before the world?
Who so wisely aided me in my rejection of a dry morality? Who so
clearly set aside Pharisaism, which, as years passed, threatened
to creep in among us? Who so deeply discerned as to the spirits of
delusion which sought to bewilder us? Who would have governed my
whole economy so wisely, richly, and hospitably, when circumstances
commanded? Who have taken indifferently the part of servant or
mistress without, on the one side, affecting an especial spirituality;
on the other, being sullied by any worldly pride? Who, in a community
where all ranks are eager to be on a level, would, from wise and real
causes, have known how to maintain inward and outward distinctions?
Who, without a murmur, has seen her husband encounter such dangers by
land and sea? Who undertaken with him and sustained such astonishing
pilgrimages? Who, amid such difficulties, would have always held _up
her head and supported me_? Who found such vast sums of money and
acquitted them on her own credit? And, finally, who, of all human
beings, could so well understand and interpret to others my inner and
outer being, as this one, of such nobleness in her way of thinking,
such great intellectual capacity, and so free from the theological
perplexities that enveloped me?" Let any one peruse, with all
intentness, the lineaments of this portrait, and he will be impressed
with the fact, that it is possible for woman to fulfil her mission,
and become a true helpmeet. This woman was not a copy. She was not
a cipher. She was an original; and while she loved and honored her
husband, she thought for herself on all subjects, with so much
intelligence, that he could and did look on her as a sister and friend
also.
The third and highest grade of marriage union is the religious,
which may be expressed "as a pilgrimage round a common shrine." This
includes the other,--home sympathies and household wisdom,--for these
pilgrims know how to assist each other along the dusty way.
These facts should be remembered in her education. The beautiful forms
which everywhere exist in nature should be impressed upon the female
mind, and the treasures of elegant literature should be opened to her
in no stinted measure.
A well-disciplined and a well-stored mind she does indeed require;
but a heart of pure affections, a lively imagination, and quick
sensibilities to give depth, and form, and beauty, and vivacity to the
character of her mind, are so peculiarly feminine accomplishments,
that without them a woman of the greatest intellect is, as it were,
unsexed and disrobed of her loveliest charms. She may be a Queen
Elizabeth, and conquer a Spanish Armada, but she will never conquer
the heart, nor be recognized as a model of female character. She is to
be the mother of her race. This fixes the sphere of her duties in the
home. Think of Helen Olcott, the wife of Rums Choate; of the first
Mrs. Webster, and of her influence upon that man who won the proud
appellation, "The Great Expounder."
The story is told of Daniel Webster meeting a woman with her two boys
loaded down with bundles, at the Jersey Ferry, in New York. The lady
had lost her fortune through the failure of her husband. She was poor,
and the old set ignored her. But she lived in a little cottage in New
Jersey, and made it bright with her face of love. She was tired and
sad. Many had passed her. Mr. Webster, seeing her perplexity, offered
to relieve her of her bundles, and take charge of one of the boys.
They entered the cars. He talked to her of her God-given trust, of her
work, and of the results that would naturally flow from her efforts;
of the province of a mother, of the trust reposed in her by God
himself. She was encouraged and strengthened, and when she came to the
depot, she said, "Please, sir, give me your card, that I may mention
your name to my husband." She hurried out, and looked at it, and saw
the name of Daniel Webster. The woman was thrilled with the joy that
came to her in her sphere of service. Earth knows no fairer, holier
relation than that of mother; and she turned with delight from the
bubbles and froth of fashion to the grand work before her of raising
men for God and humanity.
"The treasures of the deep are not so precious
As are the concealed comforts of a man
Locked up in woman's love. I scent the air
Of blessings when I come but near the house.
What a delicious breath marriage sends forth!
The violet bed's not sweeter."
Think of the realm in which woman may rule. If she be elegant and
refined; if she has learned how to govern, first herself, and then
those about her, there is a charm diffused through the home which
reveals itself in the good order of the establishment, in the
politeness of the servants, in the genial disposition of the children,
in the delightful intercourse of the different portions of the
household, and in the fact that "her husband is known in the gates
when he sitteth among the elders of the land. Strength and honor are
her clothing, and she shall rejoice in time to come. She openeth her
mouth with wisdom, and her tongue is the law of kindness. She looketh
well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of
idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also,
and he praiseth her. Many daughters have done virtuously; but thou
excellest them all."
In such words did King Lemuel praise this excellency of woman. Blessed
memory! Who does not remember that one form of the old-fashioned
mother,--the law of whose life was love; one who was the divinity
of our infancy, and the sacred presence in the shrine of our first
earthly idolatry; one whose heart was ever green, though the snows of
time had gathered in the boughs of her life-tree; one to whom we never
grow old, but in the plumed troop or the grave council are children
still; one who welcomed us coming, blessed us going, and forgets us
never; one who waits for the echo of our returning footstep, or who,
perhaps, has gone on to the better land, and keeps a light in the
window for those left behind.
Such women have power now as did the Hannahs and the Ruths of the
olden time. When thinking of them, you are convinced that, young or
old, they remain among the best of God's gifts to man. This leads us
to remark further, that woman's right to be a woman implies her right
to help woman. Woman must be true to her sex, or society will neglect
its duty. That old story of Ruth and Naomi has ploughed through the
world, because it reveals woman's power as a helper. Ruth clung to
Naomi, and Naomi helped her daughter to find Boaz, that noble prince
in Israel; and so she became identified with the succession of
promise. The life of Mrs. Sigourney illustrates the same truth. See
her among the young, calling forth their powers, and starting them in
a career of usefulness. Impressed with the importance of an education,
she aided by her pen, as by her example, to induce the ladies of her
acquaintance to obtain a thorough knowledge of the primary branches
that enter into daily use.
We want a woman to be intellectual without being puny. We ask that she
remain a pliant vine, and that she be not made into the rugged oak.
Woman owes it to herself that she be fitted to occupy any position
in society. In this land, as in no other, the barriers of caste are
removed, and every line of separation obliterated. The rich and the
poor meet together.
The cultured sewing-girl is quite likely to become the wife of the
future millionnaire; and the lady reared in the midst of every luxury,
and endowed with a fortune, amid the reverses of fortune may be
compelled to draw upon her own resources of labor, and of love, and
culture, to stay up the hands and encourage the heart of the man more
than ever dependent upon her for happiness and hope.
Such a woman Irving must have painted when he wrote, "I have often had
occasion to remark the fortitude with which women sustain the most
overwhelming reverses of fortune. Those disasters which break down the
spirit of a man, and prostrate him in the dust, seem to call forth all
the energies of the softer sex, and give such intrepidity and devotion
to their character, that at times it approaches to sublimity."
Nothing can be more touching than to behold a soft and tender female,
who had been all weakness, and dependence, and alive to every trivial
roughness, while treading the prosperous paths of life, suddenly
rising in mental force to be the comforter and supporter of her
husband under misfortunes, and abiding, with unshrinking firmness, the
bitterest blasts of adversity.
As the vine, which has long twined its graceful foliage about the oak,
and been lifted by it into sunshine, will, when the lordly plant is
rifted by the thunderbolt, cling round it with caressing tendrils,
and bind up its shattered boughs, so it is beautifully ordained by
Providence that woman, who is the mere dependent and ornament of man
in his happier hours, should be his stay and solace when smitten with
sudden calamity; winding herself into the rugged recesses of his
nature, tenderly supporting the head and binding up the broken heart.
To fill this feature of the wife, education is essential in household
affairs, quite as much as education in books, in music, and the ways
of fashion is essential to the young wife whose husband has suddenly
become rich, and has given up his chambers and taken an elegant house
in some fashionable street.
It is as bad to fall from the heights of opulence, and know not how
to sweep a room, make a bed, or cook a meal, as it is to rise to an
exalted position, and know not how to welcome company or preside at a
feast.
The women in America who suddenly become elevated in rank, and buy
pictures by the yard and books by the cord, are quite as abundant as
are those who lose fortune and rank, and are compelled to seek menial
employments.
The happiness secured by the proper employment of time, and by the
cultivation of the mind, furnishes a high incentive to exertion.
Contrast the woman who is educated with the one uneducated. See her in
her home, reigning a queen, while her uneducated sister, though she
may have wealth and beauty, will constantly feel the lack of that
which gold cannot procure nor fortune provide. "We are foolish,
and without excuse foolish," said Ruskin, "in speaking of the
'superiority' of one sex to the other, as if they could be compared in
similar things. Each has what the other has not; each completes the
other, and is completed by the other; they are in nothing alike;
and the happiness and perfection of both depend on each asking and
receiving from the other what the other only can give. Their separate
characters are briefly these: The man's power is active, progressive,
defensive. He is eminently the doer, the creator, the discoverer, the
defender. His intellect is for speculation and invention; his energy
for adventure, for work, for conquest, whenever war is just, whenever
conquest is necessary. But the woman's power is for love, not for
battles; and her intellect is not for invention or creation, but for
sweet ordering arrangement and decision. She sees the qualities of
things, their claims, and their places. Her great function is Praise;
she enters into no contest, but infallibly judges the crown of
contest. By her office and her place, she is protected from all danger
and temptation. The man, in his rough work in the open world, must
encounter all peril and trial. To him, therefore, the failure, the
offence, the inevitable error; often he must be wounded, or subdued,
often misled, and always burdened. But he guards the woman from all
this. Within his house, as ruled by her,--unless she herself has
sought it,--need enter no danger, no temptation, no cause of error or
offence. This is the true nature of home,--it is the place of peace;
the shelter, not only from all injury, but from all terror, doubt, and
derision. In so far as it is not this, it is not home; so far as
the anxieties of the outer life penetrate into it, and the
inconsistently-minded, unknown, unloved, or hostile society of the
outer world is allowed, either by husband or wife, to cross the
threshold, it ceases to be home; it is then only a part of that outer
world which you have roofed over and lighted a fire in. But so far as
it is a sacred place, a vestal temple, a temple of the hearth, watched
over by household gods, before whose faces none may come but those
whom they can receive with love,--so far as it is this, and roof and
fire are types only of a nobler shade and light,--shadows of the rock
in a weary land, and light as of the Pharos in the stormy sea; so far
it vindicates the name, and fulfils the praise, of home. And wherever
a true wife comes, this home is always round her. The stars only may
be overhead; the glow-worm in the night--cold grass may be the
only fire at her foot; but home is yet wherever she is; and for a
noble-woman it stretches far round her, better than ceiled with cedar,
or painted with vermilion, shedding its quiet light far, for those who
else were homeless."
Possess these qualifications and woman will be respected and beloved.
Her area of usefulness will be enlarged.
The man of brains and of industry and economy, has the promise of
wealth and position much more certainly than the indolent son of a
wealthy father. Respect such young men, and fit yourselves, young
women, to be worthy of them.
Remember position is emptiness itself, unless there be talent, piety,
and culture to adorn it.
We have asked the poor to help the rich. It is equally important that
the rich help the poor. It is impossible to overestimate the value of
those visitations of the noble few who leave their homes and seek out
the little room of the poor seamstress, and carry sunlight and love
and comfort into the abodes of the impoverished and the sorrowful.
Not only that, but it is possible and practicable for women of wealth
and culture to help their sex to reach positions of respectability and
usefulness.
Mary Lyon is known and honored throughout the world for her work in
behalf of women.
Imagine our first ladies opening their parlors to girls who earn by
industry and diligence in study, by purity of heart and blamelessness
of life, the right to attention and respect.
Let it be known that the woman who makes a good record in the shop
shall be respected in the home, and that she who becomes skilled in
thought and acquainted with scientific research, should find thereby
an introduction to society, that will ennoble her, and it is
impossible to describe the effect that would be produced upon the
minds of all. In this work women of culture can keep step with Jesus,
and become the benefactresses of their sex and blessings to mankind.
Let woman help woman, and society will be reformed. Let man be true to
woman, and society will be adorned.
Of late there have been going round the press pen portraits of Bulwer,
Dickens, and Carlyle. The two first are separated from their wives,
and their lives are sunless and their homes are empty. Carlyle, that
dry and laconic talker and that fierce hater, is made beautiful when
you read that he conducts his company to the pretty sitting-room of
his wife.
Mrs. Carlyle is a lively, pleasant creature, and a world of thought
beams from her dark eyes. She has learned a great deal; her father
gave her a most profound education, and she is possessed of a keen,
yet mild judgment, of which her husband himself is afraid. There she
sits sewing with her handsome fingers a new cravat for her Diogenes.
In these surroundings all feel at ease, and Carlyle becomes talkative
and witty, and displays his whole famous eloquence. Happy the man who
grows witty in the society of his wife, and finds there the atmosphere
calculated to promote his highest, grandest, and fullest development.
Mutual confidence is essential to happiness. The woman cannot confide
in the man unless he can sympathize in her tenderness; nor can the man
counsel with the woman, unless she can in some measure look upon the
world as he looks upon it.
Hence it is wisely ordained that in every great man there are to be
seen some of the feminine elements, and in every great, true woman,
there are always to be found some elements of the sterner sex.
It is because the ballot has a tendency to make woman the rival rather
than the companion of man, that it is opposed to the purest sentiments
of woman. She wishes no division, and cannot tolerate independence or
separation from the object of her love. Love cannot feed on strife.
The husband and wife are one, though God made them male and female. If
one acts in opposition to the other, domestic peace is slain on the
altar of love. What God hath joined, let not potentates or anything
else put asunder. It is an old truth, "Better a dinner of herbs where
love is, than a stalled ox with hatred therewith." Man asks that his
wife be pure, that she know but little of the deceptions and trials of
trade, that she come not in contact with the rough exterior of life,
that ever before the mind of man there might stand forth the beautiful
ideal woman, whose influence irradiates the faith, with the light of
love, in his journeyings through the wilderness.
"The family, and not the individual, is the true social integer.
This is implied in the inspired history of the creation of man.
God made of two 'one flesh,' or a unit of the human species.
Generals and legislators have not overlooked the fact that married
men and women can be relied on in emergencies where single persons
cannot be trusted. Either part of a social integer is a pledge
of the whole. The vitality of society lives in its integers. The
future grows out of its integers. They are, therefore, what ought
to be represented in its political structures. That it belongs
more properly to the man than to the woman to represent the
family, is manifest from revelation. 'The head of the woman is the
man, whom she is commanded to obey.'"
ANONYMOUS.
WOMAN AS A TEMPTER.
It will be admitted by all who will read the history of man's ruin, as
recorded in Genesis, the third chapter, and sixth verse, that woman
first partook of the forbidden fruit, and "gave also to her husband,
and he did eat." Admit the truth of history, and woman appears as
man's first tempter.
"Woman as a Helpmeet" described her condition before the fall; "Woman
as a Tempter" describes her in the fall; and, alas! while it is the
high privilege of woman to be a helpmeet in the midst of the ruin
wrought by sin, it is unwise to disguise the truth that as a _tempter_
she has not abandoned her vocation.
Plain speaking may prove to be disagreeable. God grant that it may
prove to be profitable. There is need of it. Disguise it as we may
talk as we choose about man in his narrowness, in his degradation, a
wicked woman _was_, and to a large extent _is_, the means employed by
Satan in leading astray the unwary. The manner of her fall has been
declared. It may be profitable to review the steps of her downward
descent from the bliss of Eden to the woe of the desert; from the
position of an equal to the position of a subject.
1. _Satan, in the form of the serpent, undermines woman's confidence
in God_. The serpent, the most subtle beast of the field, said to the
woman, "Is it even so, that God has said, Ye shall not eat of every
tree of the garden?" Thus he attempted to weaken the child-like
confidence she reposed in her Creator, and endeavored to inspire in
its place a spirit of unbelief and distrust. This done, and the battle
was half won, and the work was well nigh accomplished. Truly has it
been said, "The sure basis of simple trust in God as the all-loving
and the all-wise, once shaken, there is little left to be done." This
is the rock on which character builds its hopes. There is nothing so
essential to woman as faith in God. Destroy this, or let woman attempt
to live without it, and she is in imminent peril. It was an infidel
woman who declared, "It has been said that marriage is a divine
institution, because all power comes from God. _We know very well
that all power comes from God', and therefore we wish neither God nor
power._" Shall professedly Christian women, by action, give their
assent to such an utterance?
2. _Satan rouses woman's suspicion_. "And the woman said to the
serpent. Of the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat. But of
the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden God has
said, Ye shall not eat of it, and ye shall not touch it, lest ye die.
And the serpent said to the woman, Ye shall not surely die. For God
knows that in the day ye eat thereof your eyes will be opened, and ye
will be as God, knowing good and evil."
"Your eyes will be opened," expresses the power of mentally
apprehending things before unperceived and unknown; but, of course,
both in an intellectual and moral sense. The position taken appeared
reasonable, and had a semblance of truth, and exerted its consequent
influence.
"_Will be as God, knowing good and evil._" Knowing for yourselves,
and able to choose between the evil and the good. Here ambition again
overleaped itself. Humility was slain, and a womanly virtue was
destroyed by the tempter, who aimed to infuse into the mind of the
woman, first, a doubt of the truth of the Word of God, and of the
certainty of the divine threatening; second, a suspicion that God was
withholding from her a good, instead of guarding her against an evil;
and, third, he attempted to induce her to believe that adherence to
this divine command stood in the way of her freedom, of her growth,
and so by the words, "Ye will be as God, knowing good and evil," he
strove to awaken the feeling of self-exaltation,--the longing for a
higher development, in which she should attain to self-discretion and
freedom of choice and action.
This suspicion is very common, even among our good women. When a woman
gets cold in her love for Jesus, she becomes suspicious of those
she loves. She permits the feeling, "My husband gives too much for
benevolence, too little to me, and he is away too much in meetings,
and is too little in his home," to influence her. She begins to talk
against the church, and loves to stay at home. Finds excuses for
keeping away from the prayer meeting or from the paths of endeavor,
and becomes a hinderance instead of a blessing to husband, to
family, and to society. A man finds it difficult to push the bark of
benevolence and of holy endeavor up against the current of womanly
opposition and suspicion, but when in the work of God she acts the
part of a helpmeet, everything moves smoothly. A recent writer uses
this language: "Expel woman as you will, she is in fact the parish.
Within, in her lowest spiritual form, as the ruling spirit she
inspires, and sometimes writes the sermons. Without, as the bulk of
his congregation, she watches over his orthodoxy, verifies his texts,
visits his schools, and harasses his sick." ... "The preacher who
thunders so defiantly against spiritual foes, is trembling all the
time beneath the critical eye that is watching him with so merciless
an accuracy in his texts. Impelled, guided, censured by woman, we can
hardly wonder if, in nine cases out of ten, the parson turns woman
himself, and the usurpation of woman's rights in the services of
religion has been deftly avenged by the subjugation of the usurpers.
Expelled from the temple, woman has simply put her priesthood into
commission, and discharges her ministerial duties by proxy." Woman is
the mainspring and the chief support of Ritualism. Things were at
a dead lock and stand still, until the so-called devotion gave an
impetus to the movement. The medieval church have glorified the
devotion of woman; but once become a devotee, it had locked her in the
cloister. As far as action in the world without was concerned, the
veil served simply as a species of suicide, and the impulses of woman,
after all the crowns and pretty speeches of her religious counsellors,
found themselves bottled up within stout stone walls, and as inactive
as before. From this strait woman released herself by the organization
of charity. The Sisters of Charity at once became a power. They
discovered the value of costume. The district visitor, whom nobody had
paid the smallest attention to in the common vestments of the world,
became a sacred being as she donned the crape and hideous bonnet of
the "Sister."
"The 'Mother Superior' took the place of the tyrant of another sex who
had hitherto claimed the submission of woman; but she was something
more to her 'children' than the husband or father whom they had left
in the world without. In all matters, ecclesiastical as well as civil,
she claimed within her dominions to be supreme. The quasi-sacerdotal
dignity, the pure religious ministration which ages have stolen from
her, was quietly resumed. She received confessions, she imposed
penances, she drew up offices of devotion. If the clergyman of
the parish ventured an advice or suggestion, he was told that the
sisterhood must preserve its own independence of action, and was
snubbed home again for his pains. The Mother Superior, in fact, soon
towered into a greatness far beyond the reach of ordinary persons.
She kept her own tame chaplain, and she kept him in a very edifying
subjugation. From a realm completely her own, the influence of woman
began to tell upon the world without. Little colonies of Sisters,
planted here and there, annexed parish after parish. Astonished
congregations saw their church blossom its purple and red, and frontal
and hanging told of the silent energy of the group of Sisters. The
parson found himself nowhere, in his own parish: every detail managed
for him, every care removed, and all independence gone. If it suited
the ministering angels to make a legal splash, he found himself landed
in the law courts. If they took it into their heads to seek another
field, every one assumed it a matter of course that their pastor would
go too." It is because of this influence that in certain quarters the
ecclesiastical hierarchy are taking, year by year, a more feminine
position. It is not impossible that a church who worships Mary as the
Mother of God may be brought to recognize woman as the proper head of
the church. True, as the writer quoted above adds, "she must stoop
to conquer heights like these." Yet the question has been seriously
asked, "Is not the Episcopal office admirably adapted to woman?"
Between a priest and a nun there is only the difference of a bonnet
in their dress, and we know how easily woman can be persuaded to go
without a bonnet, or to exchange it for a hat such as is worn by men.
In England, the curate is sometimes called the first lady of the
parish; and what he now is in theory, a century hence may find him in
fact. "It would be difficult, even now, to detect any difference
of sex in the triviality of purpose, the love of gossip, the petty
interests, the feeble talk, the ignorance, the vanity, the love of
personal display, the white hand dangled over the pulpit, the becoming
vestment, and the embroidered stole, which we are learning gradually
to look upon as attributes of the British curate. So perfect, indeed,
is the imitation, that the excellence of her work may, perhaps, defeat
its own purpose, and the lacquered imitation of woman may satisfy the
world, and for long ages prevent any anxious inquiry after the real
feminine Brummagem."
The tendency thus truthfully described furnished the seedling out of
which grew the Monasticism of the past, and in which the Ritualism of
the present finds its underlying cause. The Church of Rome harnesses
woman to her system, and compels her to contribute greatly to its
prosperity. In Europe the people tire of those great establishments
and endowments, which rest like an incubus on the national life.
In America we are so blind that we foster them by grants from our
legislatures, by giving up the care of hospitals to their use, where
the weak are subjected to the influences of superstition, and the
thoughtless are led astray. Another avenue to power is opened by the
ballot. Grant this to that church, which, through a fatherhood of
priests and a sisterhood of nuns, reaches every portion of the body
politic, and the promise of Religious Liberty and a Free Republic is
at once exchanged for the despotism of Rome and the imperialism
of France. Infidelity joins hands with Rome in asking this power.
Christianity, united with patriotism, must refuse to grant the
request.
3. Mystery was employed as an instrument in securing woman's fall.
Rouse a womanly curiosity, and there is little difficulty in leading
the excited one astray. Hold out to her a key which promises to unlock
the hidden and concealed glories of the unexplored future, and woman
will be tempted again to forego God's favor and the joys of paradise
to grasp or wield it. In every heathen religion women occupied a
prominent place. Priestess or prophetess, she stood in all ministerial
offices on an equality with man. Christianity rejects the ministerial
services of women, and selects for its standard bearers men acquainted
with life, filled with religious zeal, and capable of hardy endeavor,
assuring faith and martyr patience.
The Church of Rome dealt with women as the Empire dealt with its
Caesars: it was ready to grant her apotheosis, but only when she was
safely out of this world. It was only when the light of revelation
was extinguished in her midst that the teachings of the Bible were
ignored, and woman was welcomed back to the place she held in pagan
climes and at heathen shrines.
Spiritualism, that scourge of modern times, which has swept like the
breath of a pestilence over the land, found in woman its prophetess
and minister. Satan works in erring woman now, as in the past, to
destroy and to delude. That power was resisted by Christian woman.
Many an irreligious man was saved from this delusion by the fidelity
of his wife. Many a good man has been ruined because his wife listened
to the siren voice of the tempter, and desired to explore and explain
this mystery. The forbidden fruit ever grows upon the tree beside her.
Those who would be wiser than that which is written, have plucked
and eaten it, and have given to others that which is so destructive.
Witchcraft is a womanly profession. The heathen divinities were nearly
all ministered unto by woman, and mystery was the influencing cause.
We know the result in the case of Eve. It led her away from God. It
caused her to listen to the enemy of her soul. Does it not become
woman to ask herself, "Am I losing my hold on God? Is suspicion that
some good is being withheld, or does the desire to pry into the
future, exercise an undue influence upon my heart and imagination?" If
so, your ruin has commenced, and a speedy return to God is your only
door of escape.
4. Deception was the result. "And the woman saw the tree was good for
food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to
be desired to make her wise; and she took of its fruit and ate, and
gave also to her husband and he ate." Sight deceived, desire allured,
and action born of a delusive faith destroyed her happiness. The
process of temptation culminated in deception. This is the end ever
kept in view by Satan. Every individual that refuses to be ruled
absolutely by God, in little or great affairs, may know of a truth
that the end is deception, and the consequent ruin is sure to follow.
There is no exception to the rule. Paul felt this when he wrote the
church in Corinth, concerning his interest in them, saying, "For I am
jealous over you with a godly jealousy; for I have espoused you to one
husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ;" "But I
fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve, by his subtlety,
so your minds should be corrupted from your simplicity toward Christ."
Many claim that error is not mischievous while truth is left free to
combat. Error poisons the mind, and so produces disease, and bars out
truth, which carries health to the mind and blesses the soul.
Eve knew the law, for she quotes it word by word. She deliberated as
to obeying it. Here she made her first mistake. A woman cannot do
this. The moment a woman hesitates in regard to discharging the duties
she owes to herself or to God she falls. She seems to be provided
with an almost self-acting nature. It is natural for her to protect
herself. She revolts against her higher self when she hesitates. Her
intuitions, allied to a sensitive nature, unite in defending against
evil. Had Eve said, "I do not need to sin to secure the development of
my higher nature; the Creator knows my wants much better than one who
seeks to be my destroyer," she would have been saved. Faith in God
would have been a sure defence against the tempter's wiles.
But she deliberated, yielded, and fell, and the world is still full of
the resounding echoes of that fall. The race fell with her. That fact
teaches its lesson. Some one falls with every ruined soul. We lift
up or drag down those associated with us. "For none of us liveth to
himself, and no man dieth to himself;" an influence goes out from
us, which is a felt power in the world either for or against God and
humanity.
Consider the effects of the temptation. 1. It caused Eve to become to
Adam an agent of Satan. Tempted herself, she became a tempter. Ruined
in her nature by this exclusion of God, and by this welcome of Satan,
she seeks to ruin her companion. This principle rules now. The carnal
heart is at enmity with God, the converted heart is in union with God.
Here is a significant fact. A man loves to have woman pure, if he is
impure. Temperate, if he is intemperate. Holy and Christian, if he is
the opposite in every particular. Not so a woman. Intemperate herself,
she seeks to induce others to be like her. Here is the peril of
society. If our fashionable women love wine, they become emissaries of
the wicked one to a fearful extent. It is almost an impossibility for
the tempted to withstand their wiles. In fashionable, perhaps, more
than in the other grades of life, woman as a leader in intemperance,
in extravagance, and in opposition to Christ, is to be feared. Her
power is fearful to contemplate. The Secretary of the Treasury
declares that the national debt is increased, and threatens to
increase, unless the fashionable world shall declare against the,
importation of that which costs gold, but which fails to contribute to
the prosperity of the community. This is by no means wholly chargeable
to women. Men share in the blame. A sadder fact is the expressed
dissatisfaction with woman's work and with woman's sphere. The home
of the olden time is passing out of mind, and in its place is the
fashionable boarding-house. The skilled housewife is felt to be
unappreciated. Men, they tell us, prefer a pretty face to a noble
heart, a delicate to a skilled hand, a girl who can play the piano
rather than one who can cook a dinner, a pretty doll instead of a
glorious woman capable of keeping the house, and of guiding the man
with womanly strength. Ah, it is a mistake. America is the land of
homes. Our undeveloped territory offers to every man a farm. Men and
women need not to be cooped up in garrets or shut up in cellars, if
they will but possess the spirit of those who sought in this Western
world a home, and who, as they toiled with the axe, the plough, and
the loom,
"Shook the depths of the forest gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer."
The cause of this discontent is apparent. There is something in the
commonplaces of fashionable life which turns woman from the real to
the unreal, from the substantial to the superficial, which smothers
all originality of thought, and makes her a simple reproduction
in appearance, if not in disposition, of the "Anonyma," with her
meretricious beauty and dashing toilets. Is it well for woman to
subject herself to be criticised as follows? "The girl of the period
is a creature who dyes her hair and paints her face, whose sole idea
of life is a plenty of fun and luxury, and whose dress is the object
of such thought and intellect as she possesses. Her main endeavor
is to outvie her neighbors. She cares little for advice or counsel.
Nothing is too extraordinary, and nothing too extravagant, for her
vitiated taste; and things which in themselves would be useful reforms
if let alone, become monstrosities worse than those which they have
displaced, so soon as she begins to manipulate and improve. If a
sensible fashion lifts the gown out of the mud, she raises hers midway
to the knee. If there is a reaction against an excess of hair oil, and
hair slimy and sticky with grease is thought less nice than if left
clean with a healthy crisp, she dries and frizzes and sticks hers out
on end like certain savages in Africa, or lets it wander down her back
like Madge Wildfire's, and thinks herself all the more beautiful the
nearer she approaches in look to a maniac or a negress! What the
_demi-monde_ does in its frantic efforts to excite attention, she also
does in imitation. If some fashionable courtesan is reported to have
come out with her dress below her shoulder blades, and a gold strap
for all the sleeve thought necessary, the girl of the period follows
suit next day, and then wonders that men sometimes mistake her for
her prototype, or that mothers of girls, not so far gone as herself,
refuse her as a companion for their daughters."
If the fashionable danseuse is imported from the brothels of Paris,
and is brought to our cities to exhibit herself to whoever is vulgar
and lewd enough to desire to see her, thousands of the fashionables go
with opera glass, and tolerate a disgusting play that they may enjoy
a sight which is a guarantee to every young man that the woman knows
little of and cares less about the virtue which distinguished the girl
of the olden time, before whom men bowed in admiration, and concerning
whom an impure thought seemed like an unpardonable sin. Women may say
that "men desire them to go, and they must gratify them." It is not
true. Every man loves to have his wife and daughters virtuous, and
unless he be besotted by intemperance, or given over to courses of
shame, will quietly and joyfully yield to the remonstrance of a
virtuous wife or daughter against patronizing scenes which degrade,
and against permitting the mind and heart to give welcome to thoughts
which pollute. True men desire to love, and to be influenced by pure,
tender, loving, retiring, and domestic women.
Woman, it is your fault if you do not retain the affections of a true
and noble man. Alas, how frequently young men mourn your fickleness,
your frivolity, your fondness for show and dress, and your total lack
of desire for the more solid attainments which enrich character, and
beautify life. "Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far
above rubies." Whoever conforms to the requirements of fashion, at the
expense of culture, is false to her high nature, and degrades herself
in the estimation of every true man. A woman is constructed for
companionship, and in her normal condition her yearnings are more
mental than physical. It is natural for man to desire to enjoy this
God-given boon. A talented woman, that will talk sense, is the idol of
sensible men. Nothing displeases a true woman more than to waste an
evening on a brainless fop. Nothing is more needless. Let her develop
herself, and she will be sought after by men whose opinions are
valuable, and whose love is a recompense. Better far would it be for
women who are poor, to spend their evenings in reading, writing, and
study, in familiarizing themselves with those themes of ennobling
thought, which will fit them to win love by conversation, by culture,
by the graces of refinement, rather than by the outward adorning, by
plaiting the hair, and wearing of gold and of costly apparel; "for it
is the hidden man of the heart, even the ornament of a meek and quiet
spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price."
Young women need to be reminded of this. They are in peril. Exposure
lines the paths of those who pass from the factory, or from the
workshop, to their little rooms and cheap boarding-houses. You see it
in the leering look of depraved men, and in the atmosphere of crime
that contaminates their shops. They show it by their themes of
conversation. Woman must be resolute, if she would change all this.
Let her be true to herself and to Christ, and there will be no danger.
The condition of women in many of our factory villages is frightful to
contemplate, and few seem to have any knowledge of it. They pass from
their factory to their boarding-houses. Their rooms are cold and
cheerless in winter. There is no common reading-room or sewing-room.
Unless they will suffer from cold, they must retire to their beds, or
seek warmth and companionship in the world without. As a result they
are watched by men who care not for their comfort or happiness,
but for the gratification of passion and the pleasures of social
excitements. Hence, thousands of good country girls are annually
ruined in many of our large factory villages and cities, for the
lack of comfortable houses or associations, where talents can be
cultivated, piety promoted, and virtue protected.
1. "_She gave to her husband, and he did eat._" It was altogether
natural. She was the provider in the home, as he was the keeper of the
garden. She gave him and he ate. Man fell because of woman's fall. A
woman can repel a man. It is difficult for a man to resist the wiles
of a woman. God has placed in woman a fearful power, and devolves
unmeasured responsibilities upon her in the home, in society, and in
the world.
2. The second result is seen in the effect produced. "Lust conceived
and brought forth sin, and sin brought forth shame." And the eyes of
both of them were opened, not so as to have an advanced knowledge of
things pleasant, profitable, and useful, as was promised and expected,
but of things very disagreeable and distressing. Their eyes were
opened to see that they had broken God's law, lost his favor,
destroyed their home, and left themselves exposed to the terrors of
the judgment. They heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the
garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.
They knew that they were naked. In place of conscious innocence and
purity came the sense of guilt and shame. "We are not to understand,"
says Dr. Conant, "that there is allusion here to any physical effect
of the eating of the forbidden fruit. So gross a conception is foreign
to the spirit and purpose of the narrative. As the language in ch. ii.
v. 5, is an expression of purity and peace of mind, so the language
used here is the expression of conscious guilt, of self-condemnation
and shame." Look at that criminal arrested. See him shiver as if cold.
His nature is exposed because it is weakened. Righteousness is a
defence. A man in sweet communion with God is girded with strength and
endurance, with recuperative energies, of which a man is ignorant when
he is alienated from God, and exposed to wrath. "For the word of God
is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing
even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow,
and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there
is no creature that is not manifest in his sight; but all things are
naked and opened to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." The Lord
God was abroad. They hid themselves. They were afraid. Ah, there is a
nakedness which the culprit feels, which cannot be covered up. God's
eye pierces through every form of concealment, and lays bare the cause
of ruin and the deed of shame. It is impossible to hide from God. If
this world is deceived by our disguises, and pasteboard faces, and
long robes, the Being with whom we have to do shall laugh at our
calamities and mock when our fear cometh, as we shall stand out in our
true characters, and shall be judged for the deeds done in the body,
whether they be good or evil.
3. Sin not only changed their relations to each other, awakening their
animal nature and killing their spiritual hope of sweet communion with
God, but it changed their relations towards God. They became aliens to
him. They lost their love, and were tortured by fear. They feared him
whom they once loved. "And Jehovah God called to the man, and said to
him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and
was afraid because I was naked, and hid myself. And he said, Who has
showed thee that thou art naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree which
I commanded thee not to eat? And the man said, The woman whom thou
gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate."
Adam, in his beginnings of sin, furnishes an example to sinners, which
has been abundantly copied. He says, "The woman whom thou gavest to be
with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate." He finds fault with
God the giver, and fails to condemn woman the sinner. The passage is
sometimes falsely interpreted, as an unworthy attempt of the man to
cast the blame of his offence on the woman. But the emphasis lies on
the words _whom thou gavest to be with me_, by which utterance he
seeks to transfer the responsibility from himself to God, who gave him
the companion by whose example he was betrayed into sin, instead of
placing it upon the woman, who was the guilty cause. Thus he refuses
or neglects to denounce the sin; but takes for granted that woman was
as God made her, and acted in accordance with her mechanism. Hence,
Adam argued, if any one was responsible, it was her Maker. She acted
in accordance with the nature which had been given her. We hear this
doctrine advanced daily. "I am what God made me." A cotton mill weaves
cotton because it was made to weave cotton. It is not responsible. It
weaves well or ill in accordance with the skill of the mechanism, and
not in accordance with the desire of the proprietor. If it weaves
ill, you blame the maker. If well, you praise the maker. Adam, in his
reply, ignored woman's moral nature, and talked of her as though she
had been a machine. "The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she
gave me of the tree, and I ate." He forgot his own higher nature,
forgot his position, and fell. How he differed from the second Adam we
shall see before we are done.
It is noticeable, not only that Adam ignored woman's moral nature, and
the ruin wrought by sin, but he asserts a truth. Woman was given to
man to provide him with food, to spread the feast, and to keep the
house; and in her vocation, and while performing the duties assigned
her, she led him astray. It is noteworthy that God does not reply to
Adam, but turns to woman with the question, "_What is this that thou
hast done?_" recognizing the fact that she turned from God, and turned
towards God's enemy, and in listening, sinned; and in sinning, fell;
and in falling, carried with her man; and in carrying man, whelmed the
race in the ruin of the fall.
In speaking of woman as a tempter, we are not to forget that she is
woman. The serpent beguiled her, and she ate. Satan found in her an
ally; an so pleased was he with the results of the partnership he has
never dissolved the firm. While woman, as a helpmeet, becomes an ally
of Christ, as a tempter she is the ally of Satan. Not as a woman, but
as a tempter, she is the ally of the evil one. Satan works in her,
as a tempter, both to will and to do according to his good pleasure,
whenever she submits to his sway. The reason for this is recorded in
the Word of God. Some sneer at the reference to this time-honored
record; but we reassert the truth. The Bible is the revealed will of
God, and it declares the God-given sphere of woman. The Bible is,
then, our authority for saying woman must content herself with this
sphere, and try to meet its responsibilities, or she will lose
self-respect and cast away the regard of the community. Without the
Bible, her life is everywhere proven to be gloomy. With it, and
beneath its protection, she becomes an heir of hope.
Notice the characteristics of her power as a tempter.
1. She is regarded as God's best gift to man. She fills a place in
man's heart which is empty without her. It is difficult to think of
her as an ally of Satan. We prefer to think of her as God's first
and best gift to man. Even a fallen woman is regarded as a poor
unfortunate, and is tolerated because the many claim she has been more
sinned against than sinning. Excuses are woven for her, out of the
statements ever afloat, that she was in a starving condition, and was
driven to desperation; that she was turned out upon the world, was
deceived, led astray, and shipwrecked, and then did not care, and so
went from bad to worse, until she became the wreck of her former self,
and was given up to lust and the pollutions of shame. God forbid that
we should cast stones at her. In the words of Christ, let us rather
say to every fallen woman, "Go, _and sin no more_." But when a woman
persists in sinning, we should speak of her in the language of
Scripture, and boldly warn against her wiles.
A fallen woman is not God's gift to man. Before her fall she was God's
gift. In beauty Eve still remains the model. The artist delights to
paint her, and the poet sings her praises. But in conduct she is a
warning. Scripture pictures her going to Adam, hiding from him the
ruin wrought, and pressing to his lips the fruit which carried death.
(Then she was the devil's gift to a sin-cursed world.) A fallen
woman--a woman who refuses to love Christ and to serve him, who sweeps
out into the paths of dissipation and of lust, and becomes a seductive
wile--is the devil's ally; "for she forsaketh the guide of her youth,
and forgetteth the covenant of her God. For her house inclineth unto
death. None that go unto her returneth again, neither take they hold
of the paths of life."
Against such a woman God warns us in the thunder tones of wrath,
and the picture of her doom is lurid with the glow of the devouring
flames, "for her feet go down to death and her steps take hold on
hell."
This is but a single characteristic of her power as a tempter, and
we love to think that it is the least employed. A mind retaining the
perception of woman's worth, shrinks from the idea of linking her name
with impurity. We cherish the hope that she is virtuously inclined,
and cannot bear to think that she willingly forsakes the right and
casts herself down the steeps of ruin. Ah, woman, when this is not the
case society has a right to cast you off. It is because of this
faith that the good despise the woman who persists in folly, and who
secretly tries to seduce the unwary. God's judgments seem not too
severe, and the language is none too strong, though the denunciation
is terrible and the destruction certain. God makes no apologies for
sin. A fallen woman is an abomination. Her crimes are terrible. She is
the foe of the home, and the enemy of all that is pure. Hence she
is thrown out upon the rocks, and left there to die, unpitied and
unbefriended, without God and without hope in the world. By every
virtuous person she is despised. Hence, between a virtuous woman and
ruin there is a bridged chasm; whoever crosses that bridge leaves
hope, and honor, and happiness behind. Think of the thousands about us
going, unprayed for, down to perdition!
Society tolerates a man as it does not tolerate a woman. God did
business with Adam, but he does not mention Eve after her fall.
Society recognizes a fallen man as it cannot recognize a fallen woman.
Thus her crime is proclaimed to be the greater than man's, even by the
world. Let us be just. We do not heap the blame all on woman, even of
her fall. All we say is, she bears the burden of the woe. In this fact
she is warned. Society may pity her: it cannot palliate her guilt.
Thus is she advised against throwing herself away, and casting off her
allegiance to Christ, to herself, and to humanity. Let her fall, and
almost without exception she is hopelessly ruined. Society points the
finger of scorn at her, and, what is worse, the barriers to virtue
having been broken down, they seem to be destroyed. It is as difficult
to get back what a woman loses when she falls, as it would have been
to have forced an entrance back into Eden after the banishment.
2. The fact that she is a woman gives her influence. In her terrible
work beauty is an aid. God says, "Desire not her beauty in thy heart,
neither let her take thee with her eyelids." That is, look for
something besides a pretty face or a twinkling eye. "Pretty is that
pretty does," is a good motto, and utters a truth which is quite too
frequently ignored. Beauty is not to be despised or condemned. God,
who painted the lilies' bloom, and covered the sky with the wondrous
tints of a glowing sunset, must enjoy beauty, and surely made it to
please and to bless us. Yet when it comes to be used as an agent of
evil, it is to be shunned and disregarded. In all this world there is
nothing so empty as a heartless, brainless woman, with a pretty face.
Yet beauty is a power; so the heathen declare, "Every woman would
rather be handsome than good." That may be true in heathen, but it is
not true of all in Christian climes. If there is one woman who thinks
more of dress than duty, more of shadow than substance, more of Vanity
Fair than of Virtue's bower, then beware. You are not an ally of
Christ. At once begin a new life, if you would shun the dangers and
avoid the terrible doom threatening you. Cast away that which excites
passions and gives the body unrest, and seek the food for mind and
soul which gives rest and peace. Seek Christ, and through him victory
over self and over sin. Do something to brighten your home life and to
honor your Master. Clear your soul from the taint of vanity. Do not
rejoice in conquests, either that your power to allure may be seen by
other women, or for the pleasure of rousing passionate, feelings that
gratify your love of excitement. It must happen, no doubt, that frank
and generous women will excite love they do not reciprocate; but, in
nine cases out of ten, the woman has, half consciously, done much to
excite it. In this case she shall not be held guiltless, either as
to the unhappiness or injury of the lover. Pure love, inspired by a
worthy object, must ennoble and bless, whether mutual or not; but that
which is excited by coquettish attraction, of any grade of refinement,
must cause bitterness and doubt as to the reality of human goodness so
soon as the flush of passion is over. And that you may avoid all taste
for these false pleasures,
"steep the soul
In one pure love, and it will last thee long."
The love of truth, the love of excellence, whether or not you clothe
them in the person of a special object, will have power to save you
much of evil, and lead you into the green glades where the feet of the
virtuous have trod. Preserve the modesty of your sex by filling the
mind with noble desires, that shall ward off the corruptions of vanity
and idleness. "A profligate woman, who left her accustomed haunts and
took service in a New York boarding-house, said, 'She had never
heard talk so vile at the Five Points as from the ladies at the
boarding-house.' And why? Because they were idle; because, having
nothing worthy to engage them, they dwelt, with unnatural curiosity,
on the ill they dared not go to see." This seems like an exaggeration.
Yet Margaret Fuller is responsible for the utterance.[A] Avoid
idleness. The mind, like a mill, must have some thought in the hopper
of reflection, or the machinery will prove to be self-destructive.
Shun flattery. The woman who permits in her life the alloy of vanity;
who lives upon flattery, coarse or fine, is lost, and loses the
tribute paid the woman by the iron-handed warrior, whom he rejoiced to
recognize as his helpmeet, saying, "Whom God loves, to him he gives
such a wife."
[Footnote A: Woman of the Nineteenth Century, p. 168.]
The influence of married women over their younger sisters may be
beneficent and good. It often is pernicious and bad. Young women judge
of men very much by what married women say concerning men. If they
speak of men as virtuous and pure, as noble and generous; if they can
talk of their husbands as of men who have honored them with their
love, and whose kindness blesses their daily life, then will the
maiden of a pure heart believe that her dream is real, and that the
man of her choice is pure; whose heart is free and open as her own;
all of whose thoughts may be avowed; who is incapable of wronging the
innocent, or still further degrading the fallen,--a man, in short,
whose brute nature is entirely subject to the impulses of his
better self. Such men there are in countless numbers, who have kept
themselves free from stain, and who can look the purest maiden in the
eye and not shun the glance. Through God's grace they have been saved
from the path full of peril, and desire nothing more than to share
the confidence and friendship of the pure. If, on the other hand, the
unmarried are assured by the married that, "if they knew men as they
do,"--that is, by being married to them,--"they would not expect
continence or self-government from them;" if mothers permit their
daughters to mingle freely with the dissipated and vile because of
rank or wealth, and when warned that such are not fit companions for
a chaste being, reply, "All men are bad sometimes in their life; but
give them a pure wife and a home and they will not want to go wrong,"
then be not surprised if homes are converted into abodes of perpetual
sorrow, if not of shame, and the fair young bride is left to weep over
the sacrifice of virtue, of honor, and of love, on the altar of an
unholy passion. The influence of a pure woman over young women is
invaluable.
"Do not forget the unfortunates who dare not cross your guarded way.
If it do not suit you to act with those who have organized measures of
reform, then hold not yourself excused from acting in private. Seek
out these degraded women, give them then tender sympathy, counsel,
employment. Take the place of mothers, such as might have saved them
originally. If you can do little for those already under the ban of
the world,--and the best considered efforts have often failed, from a
want of strength in those unhappy ones to bear up against the sting of
shame and the frigidness of the world, which makes them seek oblivion
again in their old excitements,--you will at least leave a germ of
love and justice in their hearts, that will prevent their becoming
utterly embittered and corrupt." And you may learn the preventives
for those yet uninjured. These will be found in a diffusion of mental
culture, simple tastes, best brought by your example, a genuine
self-respect, and, above all, the love and fear of a divine in
preference to a human tribunal. Let woman live for God and the
development of her higher nature,--live so that she can be
self-helped, as well as helping,--then if she finds what she needs in
man embodied, she will know how to love, and be worthy of being loved.
Much is said about the underpay of woman as a cause of temptation. It
is for the interests of society that there should be an equality of
compensation wherever there is an equality of distribution. It is well
for woman to ask herself if she is ready to assume the burdens that
come from an equality of compensation, such as giving up the prospect
of marriage, or of sharing with man the toil of the field, of the
factory, as well as of the house. Would woman be willing to take upon
herself the responsibility of planning to economize, of building
churches, railroads, of entering into a competition with man?--Woman
is dependent, not independent.--For this reason man toils to keep his
wife, and is ashamed to have his wife keep him. His pride lies in
having his home a joy and his wife a helpmeet, rather than to have his
wife a rival and his home empty of happiness.
It is not alone by an excess of passion or of beauty that woman
becomes a tempter. The absence of love, and of beauty, sins of
omission as well as sins of commission, are sources of temptation. Man
desires an educated woman. Intellectually and spiritually she must be
able to meet his wants, and render help, or she is a failure. He tires
of a useless toy or plaything, and cries out for a helpmeet. Another
has said, "The bad housekeeping, and the neglect of domestic duties,
on the part of many wives, is, no doubt, attributable to the slovenly
tenements, and inadequate providings, and careless neglect of the
husbands. But more husbands, we fear, are driven to shiftlessness
and discouragement--driven to the saloon and gambling-room--by the
extravagance or inefficiency, the disorderly arrangements or badly
prepared food, the irritating complaints or exacting demands of those
who preside in the home. None but a man of low instinct, of base
passion, of weak character, will turn away from and neglect a home
where order reigns, where a cheerful smile, well-prepared food, neatly
arranged table await him; where a word of cheer greets him, and where
patient forbearance is exercised, even with his irregularities and
faults. It is the part of woman to win; and her winning arts should
not be laid aside when she grasps what she has considered a prize. She
should seek in every way to win, beyond the possibility of loss, the
abiding love, the unwavering confidence, the undoubting respect of
her husband. If woman would be man's equal, she must challenge the
equality by proving herself mistress of those arts that minister the
highest comfort to his physical nature, as well as to his affections,
that further his interests as well as his happiness."
Alas! how many fail here because they know not how to make a home
pleasant. Such are the slaves of servants and the creatures of
circumstances. In some cases the fault is man's, in others it is
woman's. Perhaps in all cases both are somewhat at fault; yet the
responsibility rests on woman to make home a delight. When she fails
she must take the consequences. Failure with her is often a mistake.
She knows no better. Ignorance, in some, is wilful, but in more it
is educational. Their mothers, through ill-judged kindness, mistaken
notions of life, or careless neglect, suffered them to grow up without
the necessary practical training; or else they failed before them; and
inefficiency and slatternliness, bad cooking, and worse manners, are
the patrimony bequeathed in perpetuity to the daughters. Happy is the
man who has a wife capable of getting a better meal than the hired
help, and whose smile is the light of his dwelling! Sometimes a girl
knows how to win, but cares not to keep. She gives place in her heart,
and a welcome in her home, to others more readily than to the one she
has given her plighted troth. This is criminal. A woman who does it is
a suicide. She is bent on ruin, and will find the pit ere long.
_Consider her wiles of speech_. Mystery here brings ruin to man as it
brought ruin to woman. Young ladies of culture and of refinement are
not ashamed to employ the language of the Parisian to lead astray the
companion of her life. God curse the language and the forms of speech
whose words drop with the very gall of death, which revel in elegant
dress as near the edge of indecency as is possible without treading
over the boundary! Her wiles of speech are bad, but her wiles of love
are the most perilous of all. Man needs love. He is fond of it. It is
his joy, come from whence it may. Love is the mind's light and heat. A
mind of the greatest stature, without love, is like a huge pyramid of
Egypt--chill and cheerless in all its dark halls and passages. A mind
with love, is as a king's palace lighted for a royal festival. Shame
that the sweetest of all the mind's attributes should be suborned to
sin. Think of it! each wile, rightly used, is a power given to woman
to make her man's helpmeet, and wrongly used will make her man's
destroyer.
Some one asked a minister for his conception of the personal
appearance of the devil. His reply was, "A false-hearted and
well-dressed gentleman, or a vain and fashionable woman." Woman was
Satan's first ally, though he worked in ambush, and approached man
in concealment. In the wisdom of his choice we discover the peril of
woman. It may be well briefly to review the public manner in which
Satan employs her talent for the ruin of man and in opposing the rule
of Christ.
1. Passing over her social power, and without referring to her wiles
of speech, of dress, of flattery, and of love, think of her in the
arena of politics, joining her forces to infidelity, and with the
disbelievers of the Bible, to obtain for woman a place for which she
is not fitted, and which will destroy her peace, injure and undermine
her influence in the home, and cause her to neglect wifehood and
motherhood, to turn from the interior world of a quiet home, to the
outside world of conflict and strife. It is the boast of a writer in
favor of "Woman's Rights," that "among the disbelievers of revealed
religion, I have not found, during a life of half a century, a single
opponent to the doctrine of equal rights for males and females." The
correctness of this statement is to a wonderful extent true. The
believers of the Bible claim that the teachings and commands of the
Word of God are in opposition to the doctrine. When woman joins the
ranks of the infidel, she turns from God, and loses her power in her
former sphere.
2. If there is one foe more than another, that threatens us as a
nation, nearly all agree in pronouncing that foe to be Romanism. Take
this fact in connection with the obvious truth, that it is fashionable
to pander to Rome. Because of this tendency ripening into results, the
State of New York, politically, is lost to Protestantism, and is as
much Roman Catholic as is Italy or Rome. Whence comes this influence,
or producing cause? Can we trace it to woman? It will be admitted that
the influence of Roman Catholic servants in our homes has never been
measured. The nurse teaches the child the use of the beads, and
familiarizes the child, committed to her keeping, to the cross, as
an emblem of worship. Imagine the alarm of a Christian mother, when,
because of the absence of the nurse it became a necessity to see the
child to bed, when, to her surprise, the little girl of five years
pulled out from beneath the pillow her beads and cross, and began
going through the Papal forms of worship! The mother wisely forbore a
rebuke, changed her nurse, and led her child back to Christ, and so
rescued her. How many children are finding in their nurses, rather
than in their mothers, their religious teachers? The influence of
Romish servants in our homes is felt in still another way. Because
of them there is a barrier to discussion, or even to conversation,
concerning this monstrous error, which, like the frogs of Egypt,
invades our very bread-troughs. No man dare express his mind
concerning Romanism at his table if the servant is a Romanist, lest
he lose the services so much in demand, or lest he be reported to
the priest, and so be placed under the ban or the displeasure of the
Church of Rome, which is used as an engine of political and social
power against the truth as it is in Jesus.
3. The influence of education deserves consideration. Fashionable
women send their daughters to Roman Catholic institutions of learning,
where the Sister or Mother Superior carries her to the chapel, bows
reverently before the altar, and kissing the cross, exclaims, "How can
Protestants be so blind as to reject the cross on the ground that it
savors of Popery, when they know that all their own hopes of salvation
must hang upon it?" or where the morning service concludes with a
prayer to the "Mother of God," in these words: "Most holy Virgin, I
believe and confess thy most holy and immaculate care of man, pure and
without stain. O most pure Virgin, through thy virginal purity, thy
immaculate conception, thy glorious quality of Mother of God, obtain
for me of thy dear Son, humility, charity, great purity of heart, of
body and of mind, holy perseverance in my cherished relations, the
gift of prayer, a holy life and a happy death."[A] Thus is the dogma
of the Immaculate Conception thrust upon the memory, and the gate is
opened to a denial and rejection of Christ as the Saviour, and to an
acceptance of Mary as the Intercessor. The result manifests itself in
two ways. The fashionable boarding-school girl comes to think kindly
of Rome, and rebukes all opposition to the church as bigotry or
ignorance on the part of those with whom she associates. The influence
is noticeable. It is fashionable to attend the Papal Church,
fashionable to contribute to its prosperity, fashionable for men to
smother their opinions, fashionable for the politician to seek the
favor of that power that furnishes, in its subtlety and in its power
to work in darkness, a perfect mechanism for Satan.
[Footnote A: Miss Bunkley's Book, pp. 22 and 68.]
4. Our wealthy women, by their patronage of Roman Catholic fairs, and
by their gifts to the so-called charitable fund, enable the enemies
of the cross of Christ to build these magnificent cathedrals and
religious establishments, while the churches of Christ languish for
support.
Give to woman the ballot, let these girls in our kitchens become
voters, and it will not be difficult to understand how "a man's foes
shall be those of his own household."
_The Remedy_. Induce Protestant girls to work, by treating them as
sisters rather than as servants. Talk free in the house and at the
table against Romanism, let the consequences be what they may. Educate
children so that they shall know the characteristics of this lifelong
foe of the church of Christ; and, lastly, resist this movement to
change the order of God's government in the home and in the state.
Ignore it as we may, the beguiling serpent is busy with our Eve in
America, this Eden of liberty, and God only knows the result. It is
a question which cannot be trifled with. That the drift to-day is
against the teachings of the Bible, none can doubt. Victory for Satan
is a terrible calamity for humanity. Let us then, as an antidote,
preach Christ, and strive to make woman the helpmeet of man and the
ally of our Divine Master, and then she becomes the deadliest foe of
Satan, and the most aggressive champion of the truth.
"Her rash hand, in evil hour,
Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she ate!
Earth felt the wound, and nature from her seat,
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe
That all was lost."
MILTON.
THE GLORY OF MOTHERHOOD.
To understand the tragedies of the present, it is essential that we
re-read the tragedies of the past. Too many, in forming their opinions
of what should be, ignore in their calculations what has been, and
what must be. Those who are dissatisfied with the position assigned to
woman, must recall the fact that God's decrees are unchangeable. We
may resist them, but we cannot destroy them. They were in existence,
before our birth; they will survive our dissolution. It is for us to
recognize God as Ruler as well as Creator, and adjust our views, our
lives, and our labors in accordance with an infinitely wise system,
formed in the counsels of an eternity past, and running on to the
eternity of the future.
If we speak of Woman as God Made Her, of Woman as a Helpmeet, we find
a warrant for it in the Word of God. In Eden she was God's ally. When
she fell, she became, in sin, the ally of Satan. The truth may be
unpalatable, but it is the truth.
In considering woman as a mother, we stand on the hill-top of the
past. Before us lies a valley, stretching on from the ruin wrought in
Eden by sin, to the restoration wrought in the world by Christ. During
these ages of wickedness, of sorrow, and of crime, woman felt the
curse heavy upon her. She was made to feel that the _woe_ pronounced
upon her was a fact; and yet, during all these ages of trial, there
was a gleam of hope shining into her soul, because God said, "And I
will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and
her seed; he shall bruise thee on the head, and thou shalt bruise him
on the heel." Thus there came to woman, who had the first encounter
with the wily enemy of the race, the hope of a triumph over, and a
subjugation of this enemy, through her offspring. It is an instinct of
a boy to crush the head of a snake; but you cannot readily get a girl
to do so: she will run from the beast so identified with her sorrow.
The reason for this is explained in the prophecy of Eden. In a
mystical sense, Christ, the deliverer foretold in Genesis, the eminent
seed of the woman, was to bruise the head of the "old serpent, the
devil," that is, destroy him, and all his principalities and powers,
break and confound all his schemes and ruin all his works, crush his
whole empire, strip him of his sovereignty and authority, of his power
over death, and his tyranny over the bodies and souls of men. Here,
then, was a purpose worth living for and suffering for. True, Satan,
or the serpent, is to bruise his heel, or wound his human nature; but
there is no promise of his triumph.
It is not difficult to discover how this hope must have thrilled the
heart of Eve with joy. Her life was not to be a failure. Though clouds
might rest upon her, it was impossible to shut out the fact that the
star of hope was soon to rise, and to usher in the dawn of a glorious
day.
Much has been written against the fact that a daughter is not prized
in a home as much as is a son. We can understand it, when we go back
to Eden and see that the seed of the woman, called "_a he_," a male
child, was to be the instrument of working out the disinthralment
of the race. The feminine gender is sometimes used in declaring the
glories of the future. Zion is called a bride, but her glory is
all reflected from the bridegroom. Woman is a helpmeet, but the
king-bearer is the man Christ Jesus. The world turned from Christ
because he had the appearance of a man. It was a great mistake. It is
not a popular saying,--women say it is not complimentary to them to
declare it,--yet it remains true, that "God draws by the cords of a
man." All along the past men have been recognized as the gift of God.
Women rejoice when a man is born into the world; not that women are
disliked, but because there is something involved in life more than
mere existence. There are faint foreshadowings of the tasks laid on
the race. Work is to be done for God and man. Principalities and
powers are to be fought and overcome. An invisible world is in league
against the race, and an invisible God, once robed in flesh, and
living among men, is Our Advocate with God, our Redeemer and Saviour.
There is significance in the language, "I have gotten a man from the
Lord." The language of Eve, as a mother, furnishes the key-note to
that maternal song which yet floats through the world, which makes
women in China, in India, in Africa, and in South America, among the
inhabitants of Russia, and of Paraguay, anywhere and everywhere,
rejoice with the same old joy, when a man is born into the world,
because then she feels that somehow she has given birth to a hero and
a champion who shall be identified with that song of world-triumph
which is yet to cover the earth as the waters cover the sea; and the
only exception to this is found among the Hebrews, where a virgin was
revered as the possible mother of the Messiah, and so received her
dignity as a reflection from the man. To understand this problem of
human nature, we must go back to God, and study his word. Those who
reject the Word, of God are surrounded by mysteries which they cannot
solve. They behold tendencies, and instincts, and dispositions, which
are explained in Genesis, and which are parts of God's prophesies yet
to be fulfilled in this world. Ignoring the prophecy, they cannot
comprehend the facts of existence, which must exist and will exist,
whether men will hear or forbear.
Says a writer of some note, "The severe Nation which taught that the
happiness of the race was forfeited through the fault of a woman,
showed its thought of what sort of regard man viewed her, by making
him accuse her in the first question to his God,--who gave her to
the patriarch as a handmaid, and by the Mosaical law bound her to
allegiance like a serf,--even they greeted, with a solemn rapture, all
great and holy-women as heroines, prophetesses, judges in Israel; and
if they made Eve listen to the serpent, gave Mary as a bride to the
Holy Spirit. In other nations it has been the same down to our day."
In this extract, the Jewish nation and the Bible are referred to in
the same tone that we refer to Mahommedans and to the Koran. Is not
this tendency perceptible elsewhere? In looking at woman, we ignore
the Bible, and God, and history, and talk of her as though the past
had no influence with the present and future. The Bible, God, and
history have to do with the present and the future, and whoever
studies history has been compelled to recognize the truth. This same
writer was compelled to declare, "It is the destiny of man, in the
course of the ages, to ascertain and fulfil the law of his being, so
that his life shall be seen, as a whole, to be that of an angel or
messenger." This is his destiny, because it is God-given. Hence man
was the bearer of good tidings all along the past. Prophets were
generally men. Christ was a man. The apostles, Christ's chosen
standard-bearers, were men. The powers in the moral and spiritual
world are men. All that is great in history, all that thrones one
nation upon a mountain height and buries another in the fathomless
grave of infamy, comes from man. The ages were dark, because of the
lack of a man. Christ came, and the apostolic age became the noontime
of the world, not because of what the race did for themselves, but
because of what was done for the race. If a nation sinks, because the
man who has the brain, the wisdom, the power from God, is wanting, who
shall build up a people in hope, inspire them with grand resolves?
It will rise and prosper when the man comes. Christ was a necessity,
because infinite work was to be performed. Is he not a necessity now?
Is it not a man in Christ, and with Christ, who is ever the worker
on the earth? Christ speaks through the gospel, and "the key" of the
moral universe is still upon his shoulders. This hope and dream came
to Eve way back there in the confines of the wilderness, and so
incidentally as well as actually, she became identified with it, and
rejoiced when she could declare, "I have gotten a man from the Lord,"
whom she believed to be the "_promised seed_."
Notice, to Eve, as to woman now, a baby was more than a little child;
she saw in him all the possibilities of a man, who was to become a foe
worthy to meet the enemy of her soul. Her faith in this child to be
born was similar to our faith in the Child that was born in Bethlehem.
Hence her joy when she exclaimed, "I have gotten a man from the Lord."
It will seem to many as singular that there should be no mention of
the daughters born of Eve. The generations or names of men are given,
but not of the daughters. Even there and then the custom now prevalent
in the East found its origin. No account is made of the birth of a
daughter in that land. Congratulate a man upon the accession to
the family of a daughter, and the father will hide his shame with
difficulty, and exclaim, "O, that God had given me a son!"
Again, in reading this story some will be surprised to find no mention
made of the mother's grief when her youngest child was slain, and that
no mention is made of the mother's death. We know that after Seth was
born, Adam lived eight hundred years, and begat sons and daughters;
but woman's curse bore fruit. Men ruled over her, and her
individuality was lost in the headship of Adam. Do not blame me for
saying it; I simply declare the fact. This state of things continued
until Christ came. When Mary gave birth to Jesus, woman resumed her
place. The curse was met by its antidote. From God came the wave of
influence which met the wave that flowed out from Eden, the conflict
began, higher and higher rose the flood, until the ark of hope by it
was placed on the mountain peak of human history, in sight of all
races, and tribes, and peoples of the whole world. Calvary is set over
against Ararat, as Mary is set over against Eve. After the birth-song
of Eden came the tragedy, in which Abel lost his life and Cain his
character. After the birth-song of Bethlehem came the tragedy of
Calvary, in which Christ gave up his life, that he might open to man,
enveloped in the ruins of the fall, a way back to the Eden in reserve
for the redeemed.
In speaking of Eve as a mother, there is little that can be said
founded on fact. Eve passes from sight, though the prophecy, "And I
will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and
her seed; he shall bruise thee on the head, and thou shall bruise him
on the heel," worked on, and lived on, and found its fulfilment in the
triumph won by Christ. It is certainly significant, that Eve, through
whom sin came, should pass out of the world's mind, and Mary, through
whom Christ came, should vault to a seat in the affections of a world?
Is it not also significant that Mary should become an object of
worship to many millions of people in this and in other lands, and
that Satan, through Mariolatry, should strive to do in the New
Dispensation what he wrought by Idolatry in the Old? The opposition of
Satan runs on. The purposes of God run on. The prophesies of the Word
of God abide, and are sure of fulfilment, in spite of Satan. Against
prophecy combinations of men and nations have united; but the truths
sweep on resistlessly, and reach the destination for which God
ordained them.
The curse that came to woman in the hour of her fall rested on her
until Christ came. "Unto thy husband shall be thy desire,"--an
expression of subordination and dependence. "He shall rule over thee,"
expresses the general effect of the apostasy on woman's relations in
the married state. The stronger party in this relation, instead of
being the guardian and protector of the weaker, did use his superior
power to oppress and debase her. Such has always been the case, except
so far as the influence of revelation has counteracted the evils of
the fall, such is the case to-day. Woman owes her recognition to
Christ, and she is indebted for her position in the civilized portions
of the world wholly to the gospel. Wherever Christ is not worshipped
woman is despised.
Woman as a mother, under the Old Dispensation, differs in many
important respects from woman as a mother under the New. The history
of woman is divided into three portions: 1. Woman as God made her; 2.
Woman as Sin made her; 3. Woman as Christ made her.
1. The position of woman, between her humiliation in Eden and her
restoration in Bethlehem, was in many respects sad to contemplate.
She was more of a slave than an equal. Eve passes, unrecognized and
unnamed, to her grave. Sarah, the wife of Abram, finds mention, and is
described in such a manner that you behold her sharing her husband's
love, though the picture of her in the home is not a pleasant one. We
can hardly understand how Abram could have suffered her to enter the
house of Abimelech, nor how she could have taken Hagar to her husband,
and thus again have led man astray--the man whom God called to be the
Father of the Faithful. Eve, the mother of the race, tempted Adam, and
Sarah, the mother of the patriarchs, tempted Abram; and lack of faith
in God was the cause of their ruin, and consequent humiliation. There
is something sad about the manner of her life. Her home was a simple
tent, surrounded by flocks and herds, and crowded with rubbish of
every description. Woman in the East is very much to-day what Adam
saw her on his first entrance into the wilderness. The effects of sin
followed her from generation to generation. The gloom of the night is
still over her as she spends her days in out-door labor. She weeds the
cotton, and assists in pruning the vine and gathering the grapes.
She goes forth in the morning, bearing not only her implements of
husbandry, but also her babes in the cradle; and returning in the
evening, she prepares her husband's supper and sets it before him, but
never thinks of eating of it until after he is done. One of the early
objections the Nestorians made to the Female Seminary was, that it
would disqualify their daughters for their accustomed toil. In after
years woman might be seen carrying her Spelling-book to the field
along with her Persian hoe, little dreaming that she was thus taking
the first step towards the substitution of the new implement for the
old.
Nestorian parents used to consider the birth of a daughter a great
calamity. When asked the number of their children, they would count up
their sons, and make no mention of their daughters. The birth of a son
was an occasion for great joy and giving of gifts. Neighbors hastened
to congratulate the happy father, but days might elapse before the
neighborhood knew of the birth of a daughter. It was deemed highly
improper to inquire after the health of a wife, and the nearest
approach to it was to ask after the house or household. Formerly a man
never called his wife by name, but in speaking of her would say the
mother of "so and so," giving the name of the child; or the daughter
of "so and so," giving the name of her father; or simply that woman
did this or that. Nor did the wife presume to call her husband's name,
or to address him in the presence of his parents, who, it will be
borne in mind, lived in the same apartment. They were married very
young, often at the age of fourteen, and without any consultation of
their own preference, either as to time or person.
There was hardly a man among the Nestorians who did not beat his wife
when the missionaries commenced their labors. The women expected to be
beaten, and took it as a matter of course. When the men wished to talk
together of anything important, they usually sent the women out
of doors or to the stable, as unable to understand or unfit to be
trusted. In some cases, says the author of "Woman and Her Saviour,"
this might be a necessary precaution; for the absence of true
affection, and the frequency of domestic broils, rendered the wife an
unsafe depositary of any important family affair.[A]
[Footnote A: Woman and her Saviour, pp. 18 and 19.]
In Paraguay a female child is described by Southey as lamenting, in
heart-breaking tones, that her mother did not kill her when she was
born; and Sir A. Mackenzie declares that there is a class of women
in the north who performed this pious duty towards female infants,
whenever they had an opportunity. But wherever Christ is known and
loved, the daughter is a gift of God as well as a son. Woman owes to
her Saviour all she has of joy in time, as well as all she has of
hope in eternity. Though she does not obtain the headship, though her
sorrow and her pain are not removed, though her desire continues to be
to her husband, and though the rule of the husband continues in every
well-regulated home, yet woman is elevated to become a shareholder of
the pleasures of the home, of the honors and emoluments of life,
of the riches obtained by toil, and of the enjoyments derived from
culture. Woman in the Christian home is the soul, the pride, the
ornament, and the helper. Through Christ she obtains a recognition, so
that when we speak of man we mean the race, men and women, for these
become the two halves of one thought, so that no especial stress is
laid on the welfare of either, but the development of one is
secured by the development of the other. To such an extent have the
disabilities been removed from the sex, that a leading writer has
been compelled to admit, that "in our own country, women are, in many
respects, better situated than the men. Good books are allowed, with
more time to read them. They are not so early forced into the bustle
of life, nor so weighed down by demands for outward success. They
have time to think, and no traditions chain them, and few
conventionalities, compared with what must be met in other nations.
Doors swing open to them, and they are invited to walk the fields of
literary and artistic success, and whatever tends to the development
of their higher nature is freely placed within their reach."
2. _The trials of motherhood deserve notice_. We have seen the hopes
that came to Eve, and beheld their realization in and through Christ.
The trials were born of sin. Eve's eldest child, Cain, possessed a
narrow, selfish nature. He was a tiller of the ground. Abel was a
keeper of the sheep. The first born met this curse in the soil. The
second born looked forward to the restoration. In process of time Cain
brought of the fruit of the ground. Tradition has it that he brought
what was left of his food, of light and tempting things, flax or hemp
seed.
Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock, which was a proper type
of Christ. His offering pleased God, Cain's niggardly gift displeased
God. The selfish man wreaked his vengeance in the usual way. He slew
his brother, who was better than himself. The heavens are black with
gathering gloom. Murder is in the air. The shock is felt everywhere.
God comes, and sternly asks, "_Where is thy brother?_" Cain impudently
replies, "Am I my brother's keeper?" Then comes the curse. It is a
self-invited curse, for the gift he gave to God is the harvest in
future for himself. Ah, what a lesson. How early it is taught. If you
hate God, if you regret what you give, if you make it small, if you
see to it that you give the leavings rather than the firstlings, then
beware. Cain said his punishment was greater than he could bear. He is
getting back what he gave. The command is, Give, and it shall be given
back. The converse is true--Keep, and it shall be kept back.
The hopes of Eve were centred in the victory to be achieved over the
enemy of her life, by means of the triumph to be won by her children.
Her trials really began when she saw that sin was not an accident. It
was rebellion which bore fruit. Her treachery to God came back to her
in this treachery of her first born to her second child, whom she
loved with maternal tenderness. Thus the gates of evil were thrown
open, and they filled the land with violence, and the flood became a
necessity.
What was true of Eve was more or less true of woman until Christ
came. She inherited sorrow, and was born to a life of humiliation and
wretchedness. The history of woman in the olden time and at this hour,
wherever Christ is not known, is full of sorrow. In Christ she finds
an emancipator from sorrow.
There is another strange fact. In the Old Dispensation, the first born
son is the child of promise. But wherever the influence of Christ's
gospel rules, there the rule of the first born disappears, and all,
both sons and daughters, share in the patrimony of the house and in
the honors of the household. Despite this, it is natural for a father
to love his first born son the best, and for the mother to find her
heart clinging involuntarily to the younger and weaker. From the
unfortunate the father may turn, but the mother never. She will bind
her love tightest about the birdling that, from some misfortune, is
unable to leave the maternal nest.
Turn we to the Old Testament, we find that whenever man was brought
near to God, as was Abram, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and others, woman was
held in respect, and was permitted to exercise an elevating influence
in the home; and yet it remains true, that in nearly every instance
she failed to prove herself a helpmeet.
Sarah introduced Abraham to polygamy, Rebekah was a pattern of lying,
and Rachel of deception. The three celebrated women of history are
destitute of those characteristics which make of a wife a companion,
counsellor, and friend.
Do we study the history of Miriam, of Deborah, and Esther? we behold
women rising up in the name of God to help their people to save their
kindred. They were the introduction to a noble succession. Woman then,
as now, is loved for bringing _help_ to those on whom God devolves
responsibility.
The picture best loved and most praised in the Old Testament is that
of Hannah, the mother of Samuel, as she fits him for his post of duty
in the service of the Lord. In Hannah the world finds their beau ideal
of a mother, actuated by principle and ruled by love, recognizing her
allegiance to God, and her obligations to her child and husband, and
there is hardly a child in this Christian land who does not dwell with
delight upon this fact, that each year the mother made for her boy a
little coat. It was a motherly deed, and links her to the history of
the race by the blessed tie which finds its origin in maternal care.
Ruth comes next, because of her fidelity to her mother, and her love
of virtue. It is by her life we are introduced afresh to the golden
vein of prophecy that runs through the Old Testament, and which ever
pointed towards the coming of Christ as the hope of woman and the
hope of the world. Esther's love of her race, and her noble daring
of Eastern despotism for the good of her people, lifts her to a high
place, though as a wife and mother we know nothing more than that she
was hedged round by the iron regulations of a paganized court. The
revelations made concerning the daughter of Jacob, or of Bathsheba,
the loved wife of David, and in fact of nearly all of the women of the
Bible, prove that the women of the olden time left as well as received
an inheritance of shame. The names we have mentioned are among the
brightest and the best. We will draw a veil over the characters of
women such as the wife of Lot, or of Potiphar, the would-be seducer
of Joseph, or of Job, the betrayer of her husband in misfortune, of
Jezebel, the fury, or of Delilah, the traitress to her husband, and of
a score of others, that make the age in which they lived seem like the
night of humanity.
3. _Woman obtains her recognition in Christ._ From the moment God
pronounced sentence upon Eve to the moment when the angel appeared
to Mary, man was recognized as the head. Even Miriam wrought through
Moses, and Deborah, the judge and prophetess, lays no claim to
personal communication with God, but quotes his promises, and
stimulates Barak to action, So also when the angel came from the court
of heaven to foretell the joy that was to come to the world in the
birth of John, the forerunner of Christ, he came to Zacharias instead
of to Elisabeth. But when the message related to Christ, _then the
angel passed by man, and approached woman direct_. God never forgets.
A thousand years are but as a day to Him. Yesterday, in Eden, he
foretold the coming of Christ to Eve. To-day, in Nazareth, the angel
comes to Mary, and makes her heart glad with the fact, that she
was chosen to become the mother of our Lord. Eve lost by sin God's
companionship. Mary obtained, through Christ, favor with God and man.
The valley is spanned with this arch of hope. The night of woman's
humiliation is passing away. And the angel came in unto her, and said,
"Hail, thou that art highly favored, the Lord is with thee; blessed
art thou among women."
Strange words these, as we can readily perceive, from the position
held by woman previously. No wonder that when she saw him, she was
troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation
this should be. And the angel said unto her, "Fear not, Mary, for thou
hast found favor with God. And behold, thou shall conceive in thy
womb, and bring forth a son, and shall call his name Jesus. He shall
be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God
shall give unto him the throne of his father David, and he shall reign
over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be
no end." No wonder that the air seemed full of music. Woman, made so
beautiful, woman, so beloved of God, and so prized by Adam, before sin
blighted the bud of hope and spoiled the flower of beauty, was now to
come forth from the darkness and gloom of her life of shame to the
light of an unclouded day, henceforth to be made glorious by her
ministrations of love. The glory of motherhood "is the man gotten from
the Lord," and raised to work for God in this sinful world. The glory
of woman is to share this man's home as a helpmeet, and contribute by
her love, and sympathy, and efforts to his happiness and usefulness
here, that she may wear the crown of joy in heaven.
MARIOLATRY NOT OF CHRIST.
If ever woman had reason to sing, "My spirit hath rejoiced in God my
Saviour," it was Mary, the Virgin Mother of Christ. God recognized her
as a helper in restoring man from the ruins of sin. To her the angel
spake, saying, "Hail, thou that art highly favored. The Lord is with
thee. Blessed art thou among women." And in pondering in her heart the
strange coincidences, she exclaimed, "God hath regarded the low estate
of his handmaiden; for behold from henceforth all generations shall
call me blessed."
From these words it is evident that Mary appreciated the honor
conferred upon her by her Creator and rightful Ruler. It is a singular
fact, that Eve, betrayed by Satan, betrayed the race. Mary held
steadfast to God and to truth; and yet Satan has the second time taken
woman and used her as an ally, and so has brought an influence to bear
upon the minds of men which has led millions astray, and covers vast
portions of the world with the gloom of a moral night. Mary, the
"Mother of Jesus," is made to take the place of "Christ, the Son of
God," and is declared to be the Mother of God. In this land we can
form no conception of the extent to which this worship of Mary is
carried in Roman Catholic countries. To the Italians Mary is God, and
worship is simply the adoration of the Virgin. Viewing Romanism in the
light of the Bible, this is its crowning sin; viewing it as a system
combined to seduce and enslave, this is its masterpiece. To understand
how it is so, let us think how deep in man's nature is placed the
feeling of the need of a being like unto himself, to mediate between
him and God. The Bible completely meets this want in the God-man. But
Popery blots out the God-man as mediator, and in his stead presents us
with Mary, who is to the devotee the "one living and true God;" for,
though the Father and Son are known, they are accessible only through
Mary, and they stand so far behind and beyond her, that to the
Romanist they are vague, shadowy, and unknown. Mary is the first name
to be lisped in childhood, the last to be uttered by the quivering
lips before they are closed in death. Around the neck of the infant is
suspended a small image of the Virgin; when the babe seeks the breast
it must kiss the image, and thus literally does it draw in the
adoration of Mary with its mother's milk. "Were the New Testament to
be written at this hour, Rome would blot out the name of Christ and
substitute that of Mary. Take a proof: The church close by the Vatican
has upon its marble pediment, graven in large letters, 'Let us come to
the throne of the Virgin Mary, that we may find grace to help us in
our time of need.' The Roman sees Heb. iv. 16 quoted, but cannot
verify it if he would, seeing the Bible is forbidden to him." Pius
IX., at the foot of the column of the Immaculate Conception, erected
to perpetuate the fact that he was permitted to decree the dogma, has
Moses, David, Isaiah, and Jeremiah casting crowns before the Virgin,
saying, "Thou art worthy; for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to
God by thy blood." When it was announced that the French occupation of
Rome should cease, the Pope published a decree calling on all Rome
to go with him to the feet of Mary, if haply by cries and tears they
might prevail with her to avert from the throne of God's vicar the
dangers that threaten it; and in that act the Pope led the way.[A]
[Footnote A: Minister _versus_ Priest, page 7.]
For this worship of the Virgin Mary there is a reason. Satan could
not successfully lead astray so many millions of people, despite a
preached gospel and a printed Bible, unless there was some truth lying
at the root of this ineradicable Virgin worship. This root we shall
discover when we recall woman's position prior to the advent of
Christ, the place she was called upon to fill in the scheme of
redemption, and the influences set in motion by the life of Christ
upon the earth.
1. _Let us notice woman's position previous to the advent_. Before
Christ came, woman was regarded as inferior to man. She had lost
her equality. She was excluded from general intercourse, and her
confinement to her own home and apartments, without education,
without social recognition, left her without strength of character,
self-reliance, or resources with herself. "Woman's safety in society
lies in two elements: her own virtue and intelligence, and the
consequent respect for her which such a character inspires. Where
these two things are found, she may participate in general society,
mingling freely with men as their equals, and regarded, it may be,
even as their superiors. Here, it may be worthy of note, that no such
estimate or honor is ever put upon woman except when Christianity has
given her this elevation."
Before Christ appeared, the qualities honored as divine were
peculiarly the virtues of the man--courage, wisdom, truth, strength.
Womanly virtues were regarded as puerile and contemptible, and woman
herself was little better than a slave.
2. _Notice the place woman filled in the scheme of redemption_. It is
admitted by those who recognize the Word of God as authority, that
the Atonement required the sacrifice of one whose nature represents
equally the dignity of the Law-maker and the humanity of the
transgressor. In him Deity and humanity must be united: Deity, that
he may give value to the offering; humanity, that he may obey the
positive precepts and endure the penal sanction of the law human
nature has violated. It was therefore essential that the prophecy
of Isaiah, uttered six hundred years before the advent, should be
fulfilled, viz., "Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a
son, and they shall call his name Immanuel--God with us." This work
had been accomplished, and Mary was honored with the privilege of
taking the words of Eve, "I have gotten a man with Jehovah," and
making it no longer a prophecy, but a fact. So we sing,--
"Thou wast born of woman; them didst come,
O, Holiest! to this world of sin and gloom,
Not in thy dread omnipotent array;
And not by thunder strewed
Was thy tempestuous road,--
Nor indignation burned before thee on thy way;
But thou, a soft and naked child,
Thy mother undefiled,
In the rude manger laid to rest,
From off her virgin breast."
Then, for the first time, the mother resumed her place. When the
wise men came into the house they saw the young child, with Mary his
mother, and fell down and worshipped him; and when they had opened
their treasures they presented unto him gifts, gold, and frankincense,
and myrrh. The old Eastern custom, which placed the child before the
mother, was now understood. God guarded against making Mary first, and
at the same time provided for her a place. When God appeared to Joseph
in a dream, he did not say, Take the mother and child, but the "young
child and his mother, and flee into Egypt." This brings us naturally
to consider--
3. _The influences set in motion by the life of Christ upon the
earth_. First, let us review the history of Christ's personal
relations to Mary. Up to twelve years of age, his home was in
Nazareth; and Luke declares (second chapter, fortieth verse), "The
child grew and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the
grace of God was upon him. And when he was twelve years old, his
parents went up to Jerusalem, after the custom of the feast. And when
they had fulfilled the days, as they returned the child Jesus tarried
behind in Jerusalem; and Joseph and his mother knew not of it. For
three days he was away from them. When they found him he was in the
temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and
asking them questions. And all that heard him were astonished at his
understanding and answers. And when they saw him, they were amazed:
and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us?
Behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing."
It is noticeable that Luke mentions Joseph before he mentions the
mother; and when Mary speaks, she ignores the miraculous conception,
and calls him the son of Joseph. But Jesus _does not forget_ his
origin, nor does he recognize Joseph as father, but says, How is
it that ye sought me? Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's
business? And they understood not the saying he spake unto them. And
he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto
them; but his mother kept all these sayings in her heart. "And Jesus
increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man."--Luke
ii. 42.
Again, at Cana of Galilee, there was a marriage, and the mother of
Jesus was there. Eighteen years have passed since we last saw him in
the temple, when Mary ignored his miraculous conception, and when
Jesus rebuked her, by asserting his Sonship and by claiming God as
Father. At Cana both Jesus and his disciples are invited to the
wedding. And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto
him, They have no wine. Jesus saith unto her, "Woman, what have I to
do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come." Plainly, and in the most
emphatic manner, Christ refuses to recognize Mary as intercessor or
director. A third instance is still more marked. Jesus is talking
to an immense multitude, and is making a hand-to-hand fight with
Pharisees and Scribes. "While he yet talked to the people, behold, his
mother and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him."
Evidently Mary had no idea of the character or the mission of the Man
Christ Jesus, but feeling that he was popular, she was glad to exhibit
her relationship in a public manner, and so through the throng sent in
word, saying, "Tell Jesus his mother and his brethren stand without,
desiring to speak with him." But he answered, and said unto him that
told him, "Who is my mother? and who are my brethren?" It is not
difficult to picture the God-man shaking off the trammels of the
flesh and rising to the height of his great work. What a contrast
is presented between the second and the first Adam! The first Adam
yielded without remonstrance to Eve, who had worshipped the creature
rather than the Creator, and thus paved the way for the introduction
of idolatry; while the second Adam--the Lord of Glory--withstood the
influences of Mary, rebuked her intermeddling and dictation, and stood
forth to his work in the declaration as he Stretched out his hand
towards his disciples, and said, "Behold my mother and my brethren.
For whosoever shall do the will of my Father who is in heaven, the
same is MY BROTHER, AND SISTER, AND MOTHER."
Again, while Christ was conversing with his disciples, a certain woman
of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, "Blessed is
the womb that bore thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked." Thus
suddenly flamed up this passion for Mariolatry. It was instantly
rebuked by the words, "Yea, rather, blessed are they that hear the
Word of God and keep it." Thus he tore the crown from the brow of Mary
woven by the irreligious, and intimated that, as Mary was greater than
Eve, because of her identification with Himself, so whosoever should
believe in Christ, and serve him, should be the equal of Mary. The
purpose of God in forming Eve, should be realized in the womanly
character resulting from a reception of the truth as it is in Jesus,
and by doing the will of God on the earth.
Thus he severed the tie binding him to family, and proclaimed himself
the Son of Man, and the Son of God, the Brother of the Faithful. From
this declaration came the brotherhood and sisterhood of the church
of Christ, so that no matter what be the rank or position of the
worldling redeemed by the blood of Christ, he becomes an equal
shareholder in love, and is recognized as a partaker in the fellowship
of the church.
At the cross we find Mary standing with others. When Jesus therefore
saw his mother and the disciple standing by whom he loved, he saith
unto his mother, "Woman, behold thy son." Then saith he to the
disciple, "Behold thy mother." And from that hour the disciple took
her unto his own house. Once more she appeal's as worshipper, and not
as the worshipped. Her name is mentioned, with others, in Acts i. 14,
as being with the disciples in the Pentecostal chamber waiting for the
descent of the Holy Spirit.
From this scriptural testimony, it is apparent that the Saviour, by
his conduct towards his mother, shielded the church from the curse of
Mariolatry. Had he yielded in one instance, reasons for supporting the
claims of Romanism had been furnished. Mary was only a woman. She was
honored of God just as far as she served God, and when she turned
aside she was no more than any other person. Her perceptions of
Christ's work were not as distinct or comprehensive as were those of
Mary the sister of Lazarus, or of Mary Magdalene. In this Mary was not
peculiar. Very frequently women associated with great workers fail to
appreciate the character of the work committed to them to do. To the
world a worker may seem to be a wonder. To the one most intimately
associated with him he is a very ordinary individual. It is said a man
is never a hero to his servant. Is it not almost as true of his wife?
A living great man is ordinary in so many things in his daily life,
that the wife forgets his greatness. The wife of John Milton saw but a
blind man in the bard, dwelling upon his immortal thought and evolving
his world-renowned poem. As the eagle stirs up her nest, compelling
her broodlings to exert themselves, so God sometimes suffers a good
man to link his fortunes with a woman who is ill-mated with him in
every way. In the light of the fact that Jesus found little or
no appreciation in the society of Mary, and sought the home-joys
elsewhere, woman ought to learn a lesson. Is it not possible that you
mistake your mission, and strike the rock of stumbling in your home,
rather than avoid it by ignoring that which is grand and admirable in
the life of him with whom you are associated? Doubtless in a busy man,
now full of joy, and now morose; now engrossed by a thought or scheme
to such an extent that he forgets himself and his family, and now idle
and listless as a boy,--it may be hard, yet it is none the less a duty
for woman to love him for what he is, and to see to it that he be
ministered unto in his efforts. O, how dear to the heart of a working
man--no matter whether he toil with brain or hand--who feels that his
wife understands him, defends and protects him, and keeps the home
bright with love, though tempests may sweep across the path that leads
him into the world! There is a lesson here which belongs to men.
Mary's lack of appreciation did not turn Jesus from his work. It
permitted his true character to appear to better advantage. It tore
down the scaffolding of Mariolatry, and permitted the God-man to
stand forth in his grand proportions. "Wist ye not I must be about
my Father's business?" said Jesus. Many men make trouble at home an
excuse for going to the bad. It is not an excuse. The design of home
trouble may be to send a man to Jesus; to make the tendrils of love
twine about the heavenly rather than the earthly. It surely is not to
induce a man to twine his affections about the devilish and earthly.
It is not manly thus to do.
_Man moves in three circles_. The first is that of Self; the second
that of Family; the third that of Country. A man who properly performs
duties that pertain to himself, we shall not call noble. By neglecting
family he becomes less than a man. By performing them never so well
he comes not to merit applause. Distinctive nobleness begins with the
third class. It is when he rises above self and family, when he looks
abroad on the family of mankind, that he takes the altitude which in
a man is distinctively great; when he feels no longer the little
necessities which compel, or the little pleasures which allure, and
yet is able to contemplate men as a great brotherhood of immortals,
with a gaze analogous to Him in whose image he is made; when he can
look on the world through the light of eternity, and is willing to
suffer all things, and to endure all things, that by him and through
him blessings may reach others,--then it is he does that which it is
the high privilege of man on this earth to do, and becomes a power to
which under God humanity owes all it has achieved in time. "I serve"
is the law of the living forces of mankind. Each man and woman has
a place. If they fill it, they furnish a channel along which God's
beneficent purposes find their way to a lost world. If they do not
fill it, they are set aside, and the verdict of the world is, Served
them right.
It if surprising that, after Mary had been rebuked at Cana of Galilee,
that she should have presumed to have interrupted Jesus in the
presence of the multitude. It is instructive that Christ taught us
that the tie binding us to God and to humanity, is the most sacred
of all; for while it made the God-man a brother to us, it makes us
co-workers with God in carrying forward the enterprises with which men
are identified on the earth. When a man is true to self, to humanity,
and to God, and so girds himself with the strength arising from
confidence, he deserves the support, if not the admiration, of those
with whom he is associated. It was unworthy of Mary to ignore the
Divine origin of Jesus, and call Joseph his father before the elders.
She thought to raise herself by lowering him. He would not be lowered.
By his mother and by the world he knew that he had a right to be
recognized as the Son of God. This tendency to belittle greatness
lives yet. Men are seldom known until they die. We praise the dead and
ignore the living, as a rule. There is too little respect shown to men
occupying positions of public trust. There is too little respect shown
in the household. The father and mother are not honored in the home as
they deserve to be, and in the state the same principle rules. "Thou
shall not speak evil of the ruler of thy people," is an apostolic
precept, and the command, "Honor thy father and thy mother," was
repeatedly reiterated by Christ.
It is a significant fact, that Eve was led astray by Satan in the
same direction that was Mary. Mariolatry is only the outgrowth of the
seedling that lay dormant in Mary's heart, and is indigenous. It is
not natural for us to be contented with being used as an instrument
for glorifying God. We desire to be honored, as something more than an
instrument. In fact, it is true, that all are, no matter what their
powers or capacities, instrumentalities employed of God for distinct
purposes. Against this power we revolt and are thrust aside. The
_really_ great delight to recognize this truth, and their prayer is,
"Use me for thy glory" and for the world's advantage.
Another truth incidentally appears, and furnishes the root of
Mariolatry. We come to appear to the world what we really are. Mary
was tempted to place herself above Christ, and so we are not surprised
that those who have turned against Christ should join the tempter in
placing Mary above her Son. The refutation is the life of Christ,
who died for man, and the life of Mary, who never forgot herself in
thinking of others. The triumph of Mary was won by submission. Had she
revolted against Christ, she had lost all. In the First Epistle of
Paul to the Corinthians, the apostle speaks of the glory of the women
as of a thing distinct from the glory of the men. They are the two
opposite poles of the sphere of humanity. "Their provinces are not
the same, but different. The qualities which are beautiful when
predominant in one are not beautiful when predominant in the other.
That which is the glory of the one is not the glory of the other." The
glory of true womanhood is a combination of various qualities, many
of which were illustrated by the life of Mary. She was considerate of
others. She was submissive. As has been said, "In the very outset of
the Bible, submission is revealed as her peculiar lot and destiny.
If you were merely to look at the words as they stand declaring the
results of the fall, you would be inclined to call that vocation of
obedience a curse but in the spirit of Christ it is transformed, like
labor, into a blessing." The origin or root of Mariolatry has been
accounted for in the following manner: "In all Christian ages the
especial glory ascribed to the Virgin Mother is purity of heart
and life. Gradually in the history of the Christian church, the
recognition of this became idolatry. The works of early Christian
art commonly exhibit the progress of this perversion. They show how
Mariolatry grew up. The first pictures of the early Christians simply
represent the woman. By and by we find outlines of the mother and the
child. In an after age, the Son is seen sitting on a throne, with the
mother crowned, but sitting, as yet, below him. In an age still later,
the crowned mother is on a level with the Son. Later still, the mother
is on a throne above the Son. And, lastly, a Romish artist represents
the Eternal Son, in wrath, about to destroy the earth, and the Virgin
Intercessor interposing, pleading by significant attitudes her
maternal rights, and redeeming the world from his vengeance. Such was,
in fact, the progress of virgin worship."
First, the woman reverenced for the Son's sake, then the woman
reverenced above the Son and adored. This is the history. To account
for it, various theories have been advocated. One, assuming it as
a principle that no error has ever spread widely that was not the
exaggeration or perversion of a truth, finds in the influence exerted
by Christ the germ out of which Mariolatry springs. But surely nothing
could be farther from what Christ taught. By word, by look, and by
action, Christ opposed the debasing and degrading thought. Mariolatry,
like idolatry, is the outgrowth of the religion of nature. The carnal
heart is at enmity with God. It prefers to worship something besides
God, and so in the old dispensation it found its idol in the hero.
As the heathen counted for divine the legislative wisdom of the
man,--manly strength, manly truth, manly justice, manly courage,
Hercules with his club, Jupiter with his thunderbolt, so Baal,
representing the primeval power of nature, became the object of
idolatrous worship. After Christ, partly because of the new spirit
which pervaded the world, and largely because the carnal heart, ruled
by Satan, is glad of any pretext to neglect Christ, Mary, the mother,
became preferable to Christ the Son. Salvation depends upon faith in
Christ. Whosoever believeth in the Son hath everlasting life. For God
so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. This
being true, a belief in Mary as an intercessor is as sinful in God's
sight, and is as directly opposed to a faith in Christ, as was a
belief in Baal or Jupiter. By whatever means Satan induces men to
reject Christ, he ruins them, and destroys their hope of salvation.
Satan induced Eve to reject God, to believe in him, and to serve him.
There is no evidence that Mary would have consented to occupy the
place to which an idolatrous world has raised her, but Satan cares not
for that, so that "he may work with all power, and signs, and lying
wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that
perish."
The peril arising from the perversion's of biblical truth is
illustrated by the history of the diaconate as well as by the history
of the motherhood of Jesus. The influences set in motion by the life
of Christ deserve to be carefully pondered. Perverted, they have
helped on error. Used and employed as Christ designed them, they are
subservient of the highest interests of society. Truly has it been
said, The life and the cross of Christ shed a splendor from heaven
upon a new and till then unheard of order of heroism--that which may
be called the feminine order--meekness, endurance, long-suffering, the
passive strength of martyrdom. For Christianity does not say, "Honor
to the wise," but, "Blessed are the meek." Not "Glory to the strong,"
but "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Not the
Lord is a man of war; Jehovah is his name, but God is love. In Christ,
not intellect, but love, is glorified. In Christ is magnified, not
force of will, but the glory of a Divine humility. He was obedient
unto death, even the death of the cross; wherefore God hath also
exalted Him. Therefore it was, that from that time forward, woman
assumed a new place in the world. It is not to mere civilization, but
to the spirit of life in Christ, that woman owes all she has and all
she has yet to gain. In Christ, manly and womanly characteristics were
united, and were in equipoise. He was not the Son of the Man, but the
Son of Man. It was not manhood, but humanity, that was made divine
in him. Humanity has its two sides: one side in the strength and
intellect of manhood; the other in the tenderness and faith and
submission of womanhood; man and woman, the two halves of one thought,
make up human nature. In Christ, not one alone, but both were
glorified. Strength and Grace, Wisdom and Love, Courage and
Purity,--Divine Manliness, Divine Womanliness. In all noble
characters, the two are blended; in Him--the noblest--blended into
one entire and perfect humanity. The spirit which pervades the world
because of Christ's coming, and of the influence exerted by his
Gospel, opens to woman a faith which has been growing clearer and
brighter for eighteen centuries. By this we do not affirm or imply
that the coming of Christ restored woman to the equality she enjoyed
in the morning of creation, or that his coming removed the curse then
pronounced upon her. If Christ's coming removed a part of the curse,
then it must have removed all, which we know is false; woman still has
sorrow in child-bearing, and man earns his daily bread by the sweat
of his brow. Christ's coming removed the disabilities from woman. He
turned the attention of the world to feminine characteristics, and
shed over them the halo of a divine light. He brought the woman up
as he lowered the glory hitherto attached to characteristics
distinctively manly. Where Christ is loved, the gladiator and
prize-fighter are despised, and a meek and quiet spirit is honored.
The heart is the seat of power more than the intellect. Blessed are
the pure in heart, rather than the great in intellect. Pureness rather
than strength is the ideal of the human heart, since Christ was slain.
While, then, it is true that the worship of Mary is idolatry, and that
the worship given to her is so much taken from Christ, we must not
forget that the only glory of the Virgin was the glory of true
womanhood. "The glory of true womanhood consists in being herself; not
in striving to be something else. It is the false paradox and heresy
of this present age to claim for her as a glory, the right to leave
her sphere. Her glory lies in her sphere, and God has given her a
sphere distinct; as in the Epistle to the Church of Corinth, when, in
that wise chapter, St. Paul rendered unto womanhood the things which
were woman's, and unto manhood the things which were man's."
Mary's glory was not immaculate origin, nor immaculate life, nor
exaltation to Divine honors. She has none of these things. Hers was
the glory of simple womanhood. The glory of being true to the nature
assigned her by her Maker, the glory of Motherhood; the glory of a
meek and quiet spirit, which is, in the sight of God, of great price.
For all women there is something nobler than to be recognized as the
queen of heaven. Let woman be content to be what God made her, to fill
the sphere God appointed for her, in unselfishness, and humbleness,
and purity, rejoicing in God her Saviour, content that He had regarded
the lowliness of His handmaiden, and rejoicing that God has honored
the characteristics regarded as feminine, which she possesses, and
which she may use for the glory of God and the good of the race.
Now, as in the olden time, it is her privilege to minister unto the
necessities of Jesus, by cheerfully contributing of her substance
to the support of His cause, and by lavishing her love, upon those
qualities of the head and heart, which in Christ appeared in perfected
beauty, and are to-day the charm of life, the power of religion, and
the glory of Christianity.
WOMAN'S WORK AND WOMAN'S MISSION.
Woman's work is a work of charity. The fact points back to woman's
origin. God brought her as a gift to man, with characteristics and
endowments which fitted her to be his helpmeet, his counsellor, and
companion. Recall Adam's position. He was alone in the garden. He
found no helper in the beasts. He longed for a kindred spirit. Endowed
with a nature too communicative to be content with itself, he requires
society, a resting point, a complement, for he only half lives while
he lives alone. Made to speak, to think, to love, his thought seeks
another thought to reveal and quicken itself; his speech is lost
sorrowfully in the air, or only awakens an echo which reverberates it,
but cannot reply; his love knows not where to fix itself, and falling
back on itself, threatens to become a barren egotism; in short, fill
his being aspires to another self, but his other self does not exist.
At this time, when the desire for communion was stifling him, he
slept, and from his side God took a rib and made woman, and brought
her to him. Behold Adam. He sees her, and is in rapture.
"Grace was in all her steps, heaven in her eye,
In every gesture dignity and love."
Milton describes Adam as saying--
"I now see
Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, myself
Before me; Woman is her name, of man
Extracted: for this cause he shall forego
Father and mother, and to his wife adhere;
And they shall be one flesh, one heart, one soul."
The imagination paints this scene. In fancy we behold Adam winning
Eve, "for she would be wooed, and not unsought be won." Won she was,
and Adam was brought to the sum of earthly bliss. They dwell together
in sweet accord, Adam fears for her safety when apart from him. Evil
threatens them. Together they would be strong, he thinks, apart they
would be weak, and so in fear he speaks of the enemy lurking in the
garden, and seeking to find them asunder.
"Hopeless to circumvent us joined, where each
To other speedy aid might lend at need;
Whether his first design be to withdraw
Our fealty from God, or to disturb
Conjugal love, than which, perhaps, no bliss
Enjoyed by us excites his envy more;
Or this or worse, leave not the faithful side
That gave thee being, still shades thee and protects.
The wife, where danger or dishonor lurks,
Safest and seemliest by her husband stays,
Who guards her, or with her the worst endures."
Eve resents the imputation of weakness, and insists on being left
forever fancy free to roam at will. In self-confidence she goes forth
and falls, and in falling introduces sin into the world.
Let us review the past, and recall a few facts which, deserve
consideration, before we enter upon the contemplation of Woman's Work
and Woman's Mission. It will not be denied that Eve was created to be
a helpmeet. That Satan tempted her, and converted the helpmeet into a
tempter. In that light we have considered her power. We have seen that
Eve, in bringing ruin to man, turned her back upon the Creator and
Preserver of mankind, and paved the way for the introduction of
idolatry, the shadows of whose multiplying altars shrouded the old
world in the gloom of night. From the ruin of Eve to the restoration
in Mary, the history of this world resembles a deep valley filled with
death and sorrow and gloom. In Adam all died, in Christ all shall be
made alive. Bethlehem with its manger is set over against Eden with
its bower. During that old dispensation, manly qualities were honored
and womanly qualities were ignored. The effects of sin are seen. God
doth not hold guiltless the sinner. The consequences of sin run on.
They made woman's life wretched. They changed the helpmeet into a
slave. Do not rebel, woman, at the utterance, nor suffer yourself to
feel that God does not care for woman, or that he willingly afflicts
her.
It is at this point you do well to survey the field. We know that
God's purposes run on. That God was not and will not be defeated. That
the plan formed in the councils of eternity is sure to be successfully
executed.
Hence God's idea of woman is yet to bless the world. What sin
destroyed Christ came to restore, and more than to restore. In heaven
if not on earth we shall see woman as God made her, and as God
glorified her. This brings us to the consideration of what Christ did
for her. He did not permit Mary to become Intercessor, and so give a
sanction to Mariolatry, which in evil is second only to idolatry.
He did not lift woman to the position of ruler, nor did he give any
sanction to the wild vagaries of the Christless ones, who are striving
to overturn the foundations of society, and who rebel against
motherhood, wifehood, and sisterhood; but he did turn the attention
of the world towards the graces of womanhood, and while he turned his
back upon those manly qualities of labor, of pluck, of brute courage,
he turned his face towards meekness, gentleness, and love, and made
the vales of life to blossom with a new beauty. He welcomed woman as a
companion. He sought her for sympathy's sake, and opened his heart to
her in the fullest confidence.
Let us notice this truth. In making woman's work a work of charity, he
continued in the New Dispensation the work which was commenced in the
Old. He lifted the thread where woman broke it, and reuniting it again
sent her forth into the world to bless it with love, with sympathy,
with ministrations of tenderness, with an elevating companionship,
which makes man worthy of his origin, and helps him to fulfil the
mission of God's anointed.
And though Satan has taken this new thought and perverted it, as he
has perverted all the rest, and though he has employed the Church of
Rome, by organizing women into orders and sisterhoods of charity, so
that woman may again be enslaved and destroyed; though the story of
her confinement in nunneries and establishments little better in form
than prisons, and far more cruel in character, has been written, let
us not be discouraged, but believing that Christ's plan is best, let
us learn what his will is, and then let us do it in the fear of God
and in the love of truth, assured that his ways are higher and better
and grander than ours, and that it is safe to trust God even where
we cannot trace him, remembering that "he doeth great things, past
finding out; yea, and wonders without number."
In considering Woman's Work and Woman's Mission, we discover that they
go hand in hand, and faith is the bond which unites them. Separate
woman's work from her mission, and you divorce it from that which
makes it honorable and praiseworthy. It is the spirit of faith, and
love, and hope, and charity, which pervades the life of the true
woman, that is her glory and her praise. The difference between woman
as a drudge and woman as a helpmeet, describes the relation existing
between her work and her mission. Work separated from this path of
faith, love, and charity, becomes unholy to the world and unbearable
to her. The holiest of all work for a mother is to care for her child.
That child, so helpless now, is to reward her by acts of love and
deeds of valor. Take away from woman her faith, let her feel that her
work is a degradation, and there is nothing more beautiful in her
attentions to a child than there would be in her attentions to a pig.
When in the country the children and their parents were floating in a
little boat on a river's surface, they admired the lilies with their
white leaves spread out on the wave. After they had looked upon the
flower, I asked them to observe the roots, and see in what they
were embedded. They replied, "The roots are in the mud." That lily
illustrates truthfully the spiritual character of woman's work. Though
her life may be passed in drudgery, yet the flower of her life is
seen in the neatness, beauty, and comfort of the home, and her joy
is derived from the commendation received by her diligence and toil.
Truly has the poet told, in this homely way, how
LOVE LIGHTENS LABOR.
A good wife rose from her bed one morn,
And thought, with a nervous dread,
Of the piles of clothes to be washed, and more
Than a dozen mouths to be fed.
There were meals to be got for the men in the field,
And the children to fix away
To school, and the milk to be skimmed and churned;
And all to be done that day.
It had rained in the night, and all the wood
Was wet as it could be,
And there were pudding and pies to bake,
And a loaf of cake for tea.
The day was hot, and her aching head
Throbbed wearily as she said--
"If maidens but knew what good wives know,
They would, be in no hurry to wed."
"Jennie, what do you think I told Ben Brown?"
Called the farmer from the well;
And a flush crept up to his bronzed brow,
And his eye half bashfully fell;
"It was this," he said, and coming near,
He smiled, and stooping down,
Kissed her cheek--"'twas this, that _you were the best
And dearest wife in town_!"
The farmer went back to the field, and the wife,
In a smiling and absent way,
Sang snatches of tender little songs
She'd not sung for many a day.
And the pain in her head was gone, and the clothes
Were white as foam of the sea;
Her bread was light, and her butter was sweet,
And golden as it could be.
"Just think," the children all called in a breath,
"Tom Wood has run off to sea!
He wouldn't, I know, if he only had
As happy a home as we."
The night came down, and the good wife smiled
To herself, as she softly said,
"'Tis sweet to labor for those we love--
'Tis not strange that maids will wed!"
There is a glory in motherhood which robes woman in beauty, and fills
the home with the light of heaven. The mother, busy with her cares,
and attending to the wants of her children, is honored wherever Christ
is loved.
Now, because the world links woman's work and mission together,
the world is full of pictures of the mother and the child. To a
true-hearted man, it is almost impossible to find any picture to which
his nature turns with fonder delight than to that of a mother with
a child sleeping on the breast, full of sweet trust and enjoying a
dreamless repose, or being ministered to in his nude state in the
morning bath. The spiritual covers the common with a halo of glory,
and robes woman in the light of love.
The same is true of the housewife. In the daily routine of duty, which
is essential to the comfort and bliss of home life, there is nothing
very attractive in the ordinary occupations of the home. Let a woman
attempt the task with no outlook, with no hope. Let her do it for so
much money, and nothing more, and she becomes morose, discontented,
sad and cheerless. Let her do this for love. Let her feel that she is
contributing to some one's joy, or that she is to use the money earned
for some worthy purpose, and at once the loftiness of her purpose
sanctifies her deed, and renders that which would have been
unbecoming, if done without a motive, right and noble when performed
under the pressure of a great and noble aspiration, for "'tis sweet to
labor for those we love."
Woman's work is defined by her Creator to be a work of charity. She is
a helpmeet. A gift she came to man. Her life is a constant giving up
of rights and privileges for the happiness of others. She waits on man
not for pay, but for love. She ministers to him in sickness and in
health. It is not the deed, but the spirit which sanctifies the deed,
that makes it lovely. Compel her by force, by fear, or by rewards, to
do what she performs because of love, and you destroy all the beauty
of the action, and convert the ministering angel into a menial, the
God-appointed woman into a brutalized slave. God made her a gift, and
the law of her life is in giving. She fulfils the functions of her
life by living in harmony with the law of love. The woman, described
with such inexpressible tenderness by Luke (vii. 37-50), attracts
attention by this feature. She came to Christ while he was reclining
at table. She had sinned. Still she loved. Here were Christ's feet
hanging over the table's edge, while Christ reclined. As he was
talking, behold this woman bending over them, her hot tears raining
on them, and she busy wiping off the tear-drops with her hair, and
kissing them, anointed them with costly ointment. She loved, and
therefore evidenced it by deeds. Her love, blossoming into action,
won Christ. He saw that she loved. Perhaps love had led her astray at
first. No matter. Love she possessed, and love she desired to lavish
on some object worthy of her regard. That object she discovered in
Jesus. She took her alabaster-box of precious ointment, and went after
him. She enters the Pharisee's house; it may have been the house where
she had fallen. The Pharisee seemed to know her character, and so he
said, "This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what
manner of woman this is that toucheth him, for she is a sinner."
Christ did not at once recognize the suspicion, but supposing the case
of the two debtors, and having obtained from Simon the declaration,
that the one would love most who was forgiven most, turned upon him
the force of the logic, by saying, "Seest thou this woman? I entered
into thine house, thou gavest me no water for my feet, but she both
washed my feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head.
Thou gavest me no kiss; but this woman, since the time I came, hath
not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil thou didst not anoint;
but this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment. And he said to the
woman, _Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace_."
Let woman's work be regarded as a work of charity by man, and the
larger portion of women will be satisfied. The servant finds pleasure
in service, when the obligation is recognized as a debt not to be paid
for in money.
No wife would do what she is compelled to perform, or suffer what she
is compelled to endure, for her board and clothes. It is when man
refuses to give her more than these, she revolts. Man never won woman
to leave her single life and her home comforts to enter his house as a
helpmeet by a consideration of the work to be done. It was not in the
contract. He talked then of love, of companionship, of help. The other
was in the bond by mutual consent, but it was regarded as beneath
their notice to talk about it. Her nature yearned for love, and lives
on love.
Now, when a man forgets that love, companionship, and the thousand
attentions which sweeten and brighten life, are due to his wife, and
when he lifts up the drudgery and the slavery of life into prominence,
and tells her that she is only fitted to hold a menial place, he
insults, if he does not destroy the woman, and degrades himself. On
the other hand, let a woman refuse to be influenced by this law of
charity, and she becomes a curse instead of a blessing, a hinderance
instead of a helpmeet.
It is a very common complaint that a good servant is difficult to
find. Some are slovenly, some are dishonest, while those who are both
able and truthful, are pronounced intolerable, frequently because of
their impertinence. All can understand the reason. The servant has no
interest in her employer who refuses to _give_ anything. The servant
works for so much money. "As to rights, privileges, and perquisites,
it is not unfrequently either a battle or a sort of armed treaty
between kitchen and parlor." Many will admit this, and will forget or
ignore the cause. Listen to the servants' story, and you will find
them complaining of the stinginess, or tyranny, or selfishness of the
employer.
Let the law of charity rule both employer and employed, and behold the
change. The mistress recognizes her weight of obligation to a good
and faithful domestic. She feels that her services are beyond price,
invaluable to her. The effect is seen at once. The sluggish step is
quickened. Love takes the place of indifference if not of dislike, and
the relations of friendship are at once recognized. No mistress has a
right to expect that her servants will be bound to her by the ties of
friendship, if she manifest no friendly feeling for them; or that they
will become devoted to her interests, if she take no interest in their
welfare. The law of mutual dependence must be recognized and obeyed.
God is love. God loves. Therefore, it is a pleasure to love and serve
God. It is a pleasure to serve whoever is appreciative and lovable. It
is a task to serve those who are unappreciative and unlovable. At the
same time a Christian servant has no right to slight her work, or be
unfaithful, because of the harshness or unkindness of her employer.
Live for God, and serve Christ in serving well those by whom you are
employed, and you will not lose your reward on earth nor in heaven.
Trusty and true, your services will become of immense importance, and
doors to usefulness will open before you because of the superintending
care of Him who is too wise to err and too good to be unkind. Let not
woman dislike the term _service_ or _servant_. Christ honored it by
becoming the servant of all, and made it honorable by commanding that
he who would be chief must serve, and by his service rise.
Woman sometimes revolts because her work is classed under the head
of _domestic_, and yet this is the chief characteristic that must
distinguish it. That is, her work must have a look homeward, whether
she toils in the store or factory or printing-office or kitchen.
Somehow the stream of love must sing as it goes babbling by, "Home,
home, there is no place like home," else woman fails in her life-work.
Her education must fit her for a home and for home work. Let a man
learn that he married a toy, a plaything, a lay figure, useful only
for the purposes of exhibiting his taste in jewelry and dress, who
desires to be petted and fondled, to be caressed and flattered, but
who is incapable of doing anything to contribute to his happiness at
home or to his influence abroad, and he comes to feel that she is
an encumbrance. If he clings to the old love, and cherishes the old
conviction, he learns to treat his wife as a plaything, and to forget
her as a helpmeet. He thinks of her as of a toy, which may be used or
cast aside at pleasure. She knows and feels the lack of his love. If
she becomes dissatisfied, and refuses to make the effort to become a
helpful wife and a loving companion, or to be influenced by the law
of charity; if she determines to seek happiness in obtaining the
admiration of others, which once unwittingly came from her husband;
then is she probably ruined, and becomes a "body of death" fastened to
one who looks forward to the grave as a refuge and a release, or who
finds in the society of other women that pleasure which is denied him
at home. Perhaps nothing is more disgusting than to see an empty brain
hidden behind a pretty face, or an empty heart concealed beneath
costly drapery. A woman who is handsome and is illiterate, who is
incapable of speaking entertainingly, is far more homely than a plain
face in front of a well cultivated intellect; and a plain dressed
woman, with a heart full of love, is to be preferred to a splendidly
dressed form which is destitute of soul. Jewels, laces, and silks are
not a fit dress for a corpse, and yet a heartless woman is to a man
who knows her as soulless as an inanimate body coffined for the tomb.
Having thus briefly considered the necessity of linking woman's work
and mission together, let us define her work, and consider what is her
mission.
Woman has work to do. Though idleness does not destroy her as it does
a man, yet it does not become her. Merely to display her charms for
the admiration of others cannot be the destiny of one created with a
woman's hand and head, and endowed with woman's soul. From the nature
of the case, her work should be womanly in its character; that which
is within doors rather than without; which belongs to the ornamental
rather than to the mechanical. There is no sense in woman's working in
the field while man measures tapes or counts thimbles, or in his doing
other in-door work for which woman's light touch renders her better
qualified. When we look at women who have become coarse in the
expression of their features, and ungainly in form and movement,
through the weight of their daily toil, we see the folly of those who
would make the woman the equal, or the rival, instead of the helpmeet
of man; and feel indignation that, since many of our women must earn
their own livelihood, we have not a more natural division of labor,
which would assign to man the heavier, and to woman the lighter
kinds of work. As woman's faith blesses as well as saves her; it is
essential that her work be linked in some way to the exercise of
faith, and to the unfolding of love. For the character of the work
exerts an influence upon woman's body as well as upon her soul. If
you will contrast the looks of a happy housewife or domestic with the
looks of a majority of the faces that are seen in factories, the truth
of the position taken will be abundantly sustained. It matters not so
much where the roots of woman's life-work grow, if up through it all,
and above it all, the vine may twine its tendril, and send forth its
flower, and yield its fruit. For this cause the love of Christ and
the hopes of a Christian life seem so essential to her growth and
development, that it is almost impossible to write of a happy,
contented woman, without describing a woman whose faith in Jesus has
regenerated and disinthralled her. Love is the prime requisite to
successful endeavor on a woman's part to be her husband's true
helpmeet; and so, in discharging the duties incident to a life of
toil, woman must be soothed and sustained in her tasks by the joys of
a Christian life. Hence the ruin wrought in shops and factories, in
stores, and homes where Christ is cast out, and where the bliss of
high and holy living is denied.
Woman's mission is to be inferred from a consideration of the wants of
man. Created to be a helpmeet for man, it is essential, if we would
determine her mission, that we ascertain for what purpose man needs
her influence.
God declared, "It is not good for man to be alone," and woman was
brought to him as a companion, to charm his life, to prolong it by
sharing it with him. Her vocation, by birth, is a vocation of love. To
be his helpmeet, not his rival; not to increase, but to lighten, or to
support him, under his cares; to recognize him as the immediate object
of her existence, instead of fancying that he was formed to wait on
her; this is the end for which God has called her into being. As has
been said, "This representation may not satisfy the ambition of some,
who do but degrade themselves by aspiring to occupy a position for
which they are neither intended by God nor qualified by nature,--even
as men and angels fell when they sought to become as gods,--but in
reality it tends to woman's elevation; and, as the whole history of
Christianity doth show, where its truth is most recognized and relied
upon, there woman is happiest and greatest."
The word "mission," as applied to woman, refers to the purpose for
which she was created and brought to man. In considering her mission,
we are safe in avowing that woman found her mission, 1. At home.
Her mission is in the home. Her training must fit her for the home,
whether she serves as a wife or as a domestic. Her life is a success
when she makes home a pleasure and a joy to those to whom the home
properly belongs. It is for this reason that there is deep concern on
the part of many thoughtful minds because the drift of the times is
against educating women for the home. Of the women who are compelled
to earn their own subsistence many prefer the factory and the store to
the work in the family, and, as a result, there are large numbers of
young women who cannot make a loaf of bread or cook a meal, who would
not hesitate to become wives of working-men, who expect to find in
them a helpmeet in building a home like that which blessed their
childhood. The result is dissatisfaction and recrimination, leaving
the wife for the club, and turning from the joys of the home to the
revel of jovial companions.
The same is true of the class of young ladies who know something of
music, vocal and instrumental. They can dance. They have studied
drawing sufficiently to be able to sketch a few flowers and figures.
Perhaps they can speak French and translate German. They know in what
position to sit, and how to move gracefully. All very well these
things in their places, and fitted to increase the charm of manner
when the eyes are lighted up by the informing soul; not undeserving
notice either in their influence upon man, when they are accompanied
by something better, for, amid all the weighty cares of life, he
is sometimes in the mood when such things do please; but sadly
over-estimated when they are made the sole substance and end of a
woman's education. They might nearly all be done by a being without
a soul. They do nothing to draw out the noble qualities of her deep
womanly nature. They leave her altogether unfitted for her peculiar
mission of a wife and mother.
Now, there are times when a woman, despite her imperfect education,
acquires after marriage the knowledge which fits her for the duties
appertaining to wifehood. But where nature yields to such training,
the woman fails both in filling her sphere and in fulfilling her
mission, and falls beneath her true position as the helpmeet of man.
How bitter his disappointment, who, having been smitten by these
gewgaw attractions, and having put faith in the mother of the child
that with this outward attraction she had corresponding qualifications
to fill the home with helpful counsel and sustaining sympathy, when he
comes to find that, instead of a _wife_, he has married a plaything,
and that his children are being committed to the care of a helpless,
unformed companion, rather than to the guidance of a true and noble
wife.
A proper conception of woman's mission as the helpmeet of man would
tend greatly to her elevation. A man who knows for what woman has been
made, and what advantage he should look for from the woman whom he
calls wife, will not select a mere toy as the partner of his life; and
when woman properly recognizes her place, mothers will not be content
to give their daughters, nor will daughters be ambitious, or even
content to receive only such a training as fits them for amusing or
pleasing man in his playful hours, but leaves them altogether unfit
to be his companion under the weightier cares and graver concerns of
life.
Let it be understood that woman's life and labor, mission and work,
point ever homeward, and whether she serve in the store or shop,
in the factory or in the home, she will be ready, whenever God's
providence opens the way, to make home bright for another, because it
has been made bright for herself. In her reading, in her planning, in
her waking dreams and in her night visions, let her live to make
her own home joyous, and she will not live in vain. To do this
successfully in the future, she must make home bright and beautiful in
the present. It is the girl, whose hand is skilful in the home, who
is prized as a companion, because of the substantial linked with
the ornamental. The same is true of a man. Talent, genius even, is
valueless unless it can earn bread. There must be something to make
home pleasant with, which it is the duty of man to provide, else woman
finds it hard to do her work or fulfil her mission. This does not
disparage woman. Her intellect should not be regarded as inferior to
man's because it differs from his. Her mind is formed for a distinct
work and sphere, just as truly as is her body. In that sphere she
is endowed with faculties superior to that of man. Here she has her
requital: here she proves herself mistress of the field, and employs
those secret resources which might be termed admirable, if they did
not inspire a more tender sentiment, both towards her, and towards
God, who has so richly endowed her. "Her practical survey, equally
sure and rapid; her quick and accurate perception; her wonderful power
of penetrating the heart in a way unknown and impracticable to man;
her never-failing presence of mind, and personal attention on all
occasions; her numerous and fertile resources in the management of her
domestic affairs; her ever ready access and willing audience to all
who need her; her freedom of thought and action in the midst of
the most agonizing sufferings and accumulated embarrassments; her
elasticity,--may I say her perseverance,--in spite of feebleness; her
tact to practise it, were it not instinctive; her extreme perfection
in little things; ... her incomparable skill in re-awakening a
sleeping conscience, in re-opening a heart that has long been closed;
in fine, innumerable are the things which she accomplishes, and which
man can neither discern nor offset without the aid of her eye and
hand. Thus, mentally as well as physically, is she predestined for a
work and sphere different from those of her stronger companions. And,
as everything is beautiful in its place and season, so is woman most
beautiful and useful when, like a modest flower, she blooms in
the privacy for which her nature fits her, and perfumes, with the
fragrance of her character, the hallowed precincts of home."[A] "No
man," says Mr. Jay, "was ever proof against the kindness of a sensible
woman; but where, in all history, can an instance be produced in which
an ascendency over him has been obtained by forwardness, scolding, and
strife for preeminence? No wife has such influence with, or even such
control over, her husband, as
"'She who never answers till her husband cools,
Or, if she rules him, never shows she rules;
Charms by accepting, by submission sways,
Yet has her humor most when she obeys.'"
[Footnote A: Woman's Sphere and Work, by Rev. Wm. Landels, D.D.,
London.]
2. Woman's mission is social as well as domestic. The domestic part
of her life is the garden, in which the seed is planted, which brings
forth the flower of social joy. A woman who is the soul of a beautiful
home is a power in society. No matter what her talents may be, let it
be known that she is a slattern at home, and she is without influence.
The pen may serve as a feather to adorn her social life, but it looks
mean when the use of it causes the neglect of the needle.
Woman may be a secret power in the home. She may make home attractive
to the refined and cultured, and thus prove to be the magnet
attracting to herself and to her fireside those gifted sons and
daughters, the scintillations of whose genius and the dissemination of
whose beautiful thoughts make the home luminous with a light which is
inextinguishable. The influence of such a woman over her children and
over the young cannot be overestimated.
"Such a sphere, so far from being insufficient to satisfy a true
woman's ambition, is well fitted, by its tremendous responsibilities,
to excite her fears. There is not one, perhaps, which a human being
can occupy, on which hang more stupendous issues. Though less public,
it is still more potential than man's."
The influence of a true woman cannot be confined to the home. Home
is the fountain, and the world gladly furnishes channels for the
diffusion of her influence. In promoting the cause of reform, in
alleviating the woes of the unfortunate, in carrying forward the cause
of temperance, in ministering to the sick, either as a nurse or a
physician, in using her pen to delight and guide the thoughts of the
young and old along the garden paths of her own loving life, thick
with the blossoms of hope, and made glorious by deeds of charity,--in
these, and in numberless other ways, woman, finding her throne in the
house, is welcomed as a ruler in the world.
For woman there is a felt a necessity which should send her forth as a
missionary to those like herself in everything but blessings. Think of
our large factory towns, where women are congregated by hundreds and
thousands. Let it be remembered that there is something unnatural in
all this. Woman was made for man, for home, for love. Separate her
from them all, herd her with her kind, subtract from her the incentive
to endeavor, leave her mind to brood in fancy, to welcome unholy
aspirations and degrading thoughts to her soul, and you leave her to
prey upon herself. Let woman see to it that reading-rooms for women be
established in our factory towns, that their boarding-houses be warmed
and rendered inviting, that the talented be encouraged to exertion,
and that tidiness and neatness be made an incentive for all, and woman
will do a work of immeasurable importance,--a work on which God's
blessing will rest,--and those who toil to accomplish it will obtain
an abundant reward from Him who declares, "Inasmuch as ye did it to
one of the least of these, ye did it unto me."
In the cause of Reform woman's help is needed. From the earliest
commencement of the temperance movement, appeals, arguments, and
expostulations have been addressed by earnest reformers to woman,
because it was felt that on any great social question the power of
woman to help, or to hinder, was all-important. When it is remembered
that woman is the greatest sufferer from the vice of intemperance,
that she regulates the customs of society, it is apparent that she
should seek to abolish bad, and promote good customs. More than others
she trains the young and builds up character, and therefore she
should, by example and precept, implant such habits as may be not
only a safeguard in childhood and youth, but become fixed as moral
principles in those she has reared, when the responsibility arrives;
because of these, we find reasons in abundance why woman must help, or
aid cannot reach the imperilled and undone.
Again: Woman needs help. Addison well said, "Women are either the
best or the worst of human beings." The very feelings which, rightly
directed, prompt her to soar even to the apex of the pyramid of human
virtue, warped from their right exercise, precipitate her to the
lowest and most grovelling depths of human vice. Is woman intemperate,
she differs from man in the gratification of her appetite. He seeks
the social club. Woman seeks retirement, and drinks alone and apart.
Her appetite, from this very cause, becomes unmanageable. Men will
stop drinking, oftentimes, when the open bar is closed. Woman, with
an appetite formed, drinks the more, because she drinks in secret.
Because of this fact, woman is in peril if she form an appetite for
strong drink.
Woman as a Mother has work to do as a teacher. "We hear a great deal
about education in the present day; but," said Mrs. Ellis, "my strong
impression is that there will have to come a teaching out of the
mother's heart and life,--herself being taught of God,--such as alone
can save us as a nation and a people from falling from our high
material prosperity into a condition of moral degradation, which it is
terrible to contemplate." Such being the case, every woman should ask,
What have I done in those opportunities which God gave me with the
young? What did I pour into that open heart and mind? Was my influence
for Christ or against him? Which way did I point out to those
uncertain feet? Who can estimate a mother's influence! There is a
power in a mother's love greater than any other human power,--a power
to suffer, to serve, and to save; a power which many waters cannot
quench, and which is stronger than death. As she leads, the broodlings
will follow. Does she sanction card-playing, theatre-going, dancing,
and what are called innocent recreations, or does she set herself
against them, and turn the thoughts of her children to books that
treat of science, of philosophy, and of religion? Upon the answer to
this question the future of children and the young depends. Many a boy
has been checked in a career of shame by a mother's sad look; many
have been encouraged by a mother's smile. God help women to know
how to use their power for home, for woman-kind, for man-kind, for
country, and for God!
"No one has such power over a river as he who stands near its source.
No one has such power over the tree as he who plants and tends it
while yet it is a pliant sapling. And no earthly power is to be
compared with that which, humanly speaking, determines the course
and destiny of an immortal soul. Under God the mother is the first
guardian of the child's eternal interest. It is from the mother, who
moves constantly among her little ones, much more than the father,
whose vocation necessitates his absence from home, and prevents his
being much in their presence, that children receive their bias. Her
gentle hand gives to our ductile natures the impress which we wear
through life; her loving voice awakens in the soul those sweet echoes
which never cease to sound; and her look and manner fill the mind with
images which haunt our memory until our dying day."
"O, Mother! sweetest name on earth;
We lisp it on the knee,
And idolize its sacred worth
In manhood's ministry."
A mother's hand gave us our first welcome, and hers was the last we
grasped in our farewell. She is the nurse of both of our childhoods;
the queen of the home, and the friend of the heart.
"And if I e'er in heaven appear,
A mother's holy prayer,--
A mother's hand and gentle tear,--
That pointed to a Saviour here,
Shall lead the wanderer there."
Woman's mission is religious. Christ recognized her as a helpmeet, as
a comforter, and a companion. Woman ministered to him with delight,
and gladly made a resting-place for him in the quiet retreat of the
home in Bethany. He recognized her faith as an element of strength,
which saves her when properly exercised. The spiritual life of woman
is her glory. We think of the woman who had sinned looking in love and
faith on Jesus, bathing his feet with her tears, and wiping them with
her hair, kissing and anointing them, with a feeling akin to devotion.
The Magdalene, delivered of her seven demons, because of her devotion
to Christ, and the triumph won by her faith, achieved a position
which, in the regards of the church, is equal to that held by the
Mother of our Saviour.
Woman's daily life is to her spiritual life what the debris of the
stream is to the water-lily that floats upon the surface. What cares
the servant girl of Rome for the place where she toils? The cathedral,
and the wonderful pictures that hang upon its walls, are her glory
and pride. Look at her toil from that stand-point, and she becomes a
helper in the estimation of the world that cannot be ignored. We have
said woman's work is a work of charity. Satan has warped the truth and
wielded it against Christ; but as it is wrong to give up a good tune
because bad men sing it, so we must not give up a truth because Satan
takes advantage of it. This work of charity,--of giving up for others,
of denying self for another's advantage, of abandoning comfort to
assuage another's grief,--so wonderfully illustrated by a Florence
Nightingale, and by women quite as worthy in our own land, whose
presence in the hospitals was like a benediction from God, and whose
presence in our homes, in our churches, beside the sad and sorrowing
everywhere, is proof that woman has a mission which she alone can
fill, and a work which she alone can perform. "And now abideth faith,
hope, and charity, and the greatest of these is charity." Man has
faith, he has hope; but he lacks, to a large extent, in the charities
which come to woman as gifts of God, because of which Christ employed
her as an agency to win men back to faith in God. In the sick chamber
she moves with step noiseless as falling snow-flakes, and speaks in
a voice soft as an angel's whisper. Her touch is so gentle that it
soothes the sufferer, and her sympathy is more precious than rubies.
On this account she is man's first and last solace. Suffering never
appeals to woman in vain. "I never addressed myself," says Ledyard,
"in the language of decency and friendship to woman, whether civilized
or savage, without receiving a decent and friendly answer. With man
it has often been otherwise. In wandering over the barren plains of
inhospitable Denmark, through honest Sweden, frozen Lapland, rude and
churlish Finland, unprincipled Russia, and the wide-spread regions of
the wandering Tartar, if hungry, dry, cold, wet, or sick, woman has
ever been friendly to me, and uniformly so; and, to add to this
virtue,--so worthy of the appellation of benevolence,--these actions
have been performed in so free and kind a manner, that if I was dry, I
drank the sweet draught, and if hungry, ate the coarse morsel, with
a double relish." Park, and many other travellers, bear similar
testimony.
"Woman all exceeds
In ardent sanctitude, in pious deeds;
And chief in woman charities prevail,
That soothe when sorrow or desire assail;
Ask the poor pilgrim on this convex cast,--
His grizzled locks, distorted in the blast,--
Ask him what accents soothe, what hand bestows
The cordial beverage, raiment, and repose.
Ah! he will dart a spark of ardent flame,
And clasp his tremulous hands, and Woman name.
Peruse the sacred volume. Him who died
Her kiss betrayed not, nor her tongue denied;
While even the apostles left Him to His doom,
She lingered round His cross and watched His tomb."
How precious is such sympathy in her who is to be the solace, because
the helpmeet, of man! How it qualifies her for being the priestess of
the temple of home; the gentle nurse of helpless infancy, manhood's
counsellor and comforter!
"O Woman! Woman! thou wast made,
Like heaven's own pure and lovely light,
To cheer life's dark and desert shade,
And guide man's erring footsteps right."
This is a power which monarchs well might envy,--a power to bless
mankind and honor God; a power which, working in obscure and limited
sphere, is yet felt in the high places of the earth, and identified
with the deeds of men whose names are renowned in the history of the
world, and shine as stars in the diadem of God.
WOMAN _versus_ BALLOT.
Three facts stand in the way of Woman's being helped by the
Ballot,--God, Nature, and Common Sense. The purpose for which God made
or "formed" woman is clearly avowed in the history of her origin and
in the assignment of her duties.
In discussing this question, whether the ballot, and all the
immunities growing out of the right to vote, shall be granted to
woman, it is essential that we inquire reverently and earnestly, on
which side is God. That the question in its philosophical treatment
can only be fathomed by the profoundest intellect, and that it can
be embraced, in all its details, only by the most comprehensive
knowledge, is but a partial statement of this truth. The question can
only be understood, measured, and gauged by that Being who sees the
end from the beginning, and can follow into its infinite ramifications
the influence which must result from our actions. God does understand
it. Being infinitely wise, there can be no new issues, no new facts,
or combinations of facts, to influence the decisions of the Omniscient
Mind. It becomes us then to inquire what sphere God assigned to woman.
Having found it, we shall see that Nature and Common Sense unite in
making manifest the wisdom in adhering to the Divine Plan.
The necessity of recalling attention to the portraiture of woman as
God made her, is the more apparent, when we remember that those who
ask the ballot for woman practically ignore the teachings of the Bible
and the right of God to rule, and claim by word, as well as by deed,
that they have outgrown the wisdom of the past, and have entered upon
a stage of progress in advance of old time precedents. We believe in
the rule of God, and in the wisdom of God, and claim that Omniscience
is not dependent either upon a morning newspaper, or upon the crude
conjectures of a godless Infidelity, for wisdom or light in adjusting
means to an end, or in assigning to woman her proper sphere.
Again. We are impelled to seek wisdom from God, because we seek for
it in vain elsewhere. As to how the ballot is to help woman, even its
advocates give us no light. Whether it is proposed to lighten by its
aid the penalties, and do away with the ruin of the fall, we are left
in doubt.
If we give to woman the ballot, shall the equality which woman lost,
when she ate of the forbidden fruit, be restored, and shall she be
made again the equal of man? Shall the sorrow in child-bearing be
removed? Can housework, or the duties of motherhood, and wifehood, and
sisterhood, be met and discharged by the use of the ballot?
These are questions which deserve to be answered. It is patent to
every one that this attempt to secure the ballot for woman is a revolt
against the position and sphere assigned to woman by God himself. It
is a revolt against the holiest duties enjoined upon woman. It is
an attempt to reorganize society upon a new basis; to change the
relations of men and women; to secure the millennium by a vote, and by
majorities to do away with the rule of God. The Bible declares that
the headship of the house devolves on man. Man is lawgiver. Woman is
not slave: she is helpmeet; the sharer of man's joys and sorrows; the
light of his home, if there be any light in his home; the solace of
his life, if his life have solace; the mother of his children, if
children there be. Now, as then, woman, in her natural state, before
she makes the attempt to unsex herself, and render herself a monster,
finds it in her nature to look to man as lawmaker, and expects to
submit to his rule in the home. We do not say that all women submit
cheerfully to this rule, for there are some who do not. But when this
is the case, from the nature of things, happiness takes its flight,
the marriage-bed is defiled, woman becomes an outlaw in her heart, and
the two bound together by a chain rather than by the silken cord of
love, are candidates for a peaceable divorce or a continuous battle.
The advocates of the ballot for woman hope through its aid to secure
an overthrow of this rule, or escape from this so-called bondage. They
demand a change in public sentiment regarding the sphere woman is to
fill, securing to her an equality before the law, in representation,
in privileges, and in wages.
In other words, there are women who hope and expect to do away with
the disabilities incident to the female portion of the community, and
by education and culture, obtain for woman this same strength, this
same ability to study, to think, to work, and to plan, that is enjoyed
by man. In short, some believe that a woman can be so changed that
she can, for all practical purposes, get on without man's help or
protection.
Against this revolutionary scheme we protest, because, by a reference
to the Word of God,[A] we find reasons for believing that it is in the
constitution and nature of woman, with some slight modifications, to
occupy the place assigned her in this land, where Christian influence
unites with the better instincts of humanity in lightening her
burdens, smoothing her pathway, and filling her lap with the tributes
of manly regard.
[Footnote A: I am aware that this sneer is often made: "The same class
oppose us who defended the divine right of slavery." This is untrue
so far as I am concerned. I was second to no man in condemnation of
slavery, because the Bible condemned it. That one utterance, "God hath
made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face
of the earth," was the seedling out of which liberty, equality, and
fraternity grew. Liberty was won because of the faith, and prayers,
and efforts of a God-believing and a Christ-loving church. Their
prayers and their faith girded the nation with strength, and their
prowess, aided by those who followed their lead, secured victory.]
I.
_The Scriptural Argument_.
To state our faith more definitely, we believe that in Eden woman
enjoyed an equality with man; that she took advantage of her
privilege, and, transgressing the law of God without consulting her
husband, proved treacherous to her high trust, opened the gate of
perdition to the enemy of souls, and brought upon man and the race
the curse consequent upon sin, and the ruin wrought by the fall. In
consequence of this, God pronounced a curse upon her; gave her sorrow
in child-bearing, as he gave to man fatigue in toil; changed the
relations hitherto subsisting between man and woman, and compelled
her to live henceforth in another; to sink her own individuality, and
merge it in that of her husband. This is the language. Unto the woman
he said, "I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in
sorrow thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to
thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." This is her portion of the
curse. This portion endures. Man from that moment became ruler. The
wife's desire was to the husband, so that whatever she desires is
naturally referred to him. He became adviser, lawmaker and head. The
right or wrong of God's action it does not become us to discuss. It is
right because God did it. Dispute the right who will, but the curse
lives. The serpent crawls on his belly and eats dust. The wife has
sorrow in conception; her desire is to her husband, and he rules her;
and man, by the sweat of his brow, eats his bread.
But, says some one, did not the coming of Christ change the status of
woman, and place her again on the same equality which she enjoyed
when Adam led the beautiful Eve to her nuptial bower, and found it
impossible to exist without what the poet describes as
"Thy likeness, thy fit help, thy other self,
Thy wish exactly to thy heart's desire?"
If we have not mistaken the relations subsisting even in Eden between
the original pair, woman was not the ruler even there. Milton has
truthfully said,--
"For well I understand in the prime end
Of Nature her the inferior, in the mind
And inward faculties which most excel,
In outward, also, her resembling less
His image who made both, and less expressing
The character of that dominion given
O'er other creatures; yet when I approach
Her loveliness, so absolute she seems,
And in herself complete, so well to know
Her own, that what she wills to do or say
Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best:
All higher knowledge in her presence falls
Degraded; wisdom in discourse with her
Loses discountenanced, and like folly shows;
Authority and reason on her wait,
As one intended first, not after made
Occasionally; and to consummate all,
Greatness of mind and nobleness their seat
Build in her, loveliest, and create an awe
About her, as a guard angelic placed."
With woman, as God made her, we are not acquainted. Glimpses of her
pristine beauty, and characteristics of her former excellence, shine
forth; but sin has marred the original picture, and defaced the model
fashioned by the Creator's hand. The ruin wrought by the fall brought
Christ to earth. He opened a way back to Eden--not on earth, but in
heaven. The curse remains. The race is under it, because sin is in the
world. The law, formed after the fall, is the expressed will of God.
Christ did not come to do away with it, but to fulfil it. Then, as
now, it was a law of love, of good will, of peace. When Christ came,
woman's condition was deplorable. She was the abject slave of man in
nearly all the world. Yet Christ made no attempt to break down their
original arrangements. He knew that without a change in woman herself,
no external changes in her condition could be of any benefit to her.
He recognized the great fact that she herself must be educated to a
better life, that she must have a character which in itself would
command respect, and make her worthy of a higher place and a larger
liberty. Truly has it been said, "Institutions, of themselves, can
never confer freedom upon a people. They must be free men, capable
of liberty, and then they will be able not only to make their own
institutions, but keep and defend them also. So the emancipation of
woman can be effected only by breaking the bonds of her ignorance,
frivolity, and vice. A character must be given her, and then the iron
door of her prison-house will open to her of its own accord, and
she will find that the angel of liberty has been leading her forth
indeed." In this direction Jesus labored. Paul, in his Epistles, gave
emphasis to the teachings of the Old Testament, and so he wrote, "Let
your women keep silence, in the churches, for it is not permitted them
to speak; but they are to be in subjection, as the law also says; and
if they will to learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home;
for it is a shame for women to speak in the church,"--I Cor. xiv. 34,
35.
Against this command many arguments have been brought to bear, and
despite this apostolic command, some women insist upon their right to
preach. It is a significant truth, that whoever does this, enters upon
a conflict with public sentiment born of God, and subjects herself to
terrible mortification. The refusal of lending Universalist divines to
share the exercises of an ordination with a woman, illustrates this
principle. The recognition given to man as the head of the household,
involves the loss of woman's individuality, and of her right to a
support. It opens a window to life, and shows why our higher nature
revolts against woman being compelled to labor in the field. That is
man's place, and the labor elevates him. It degrades a woman. The
praises of agricultural toil for man find a place in song and story;
but labor in the field is destructive of womanhood, of motherhood, and
of wifehood.
We have seen that the Scriptures declare, 1. That it is not well for
man to be alone. He is not complete until woman is joined to him in
marriage. 2. Woman was made for man. Manliness is an attribute that
belongs to man; it disgraces a woman. To be womanly, is the noblest
tribute that can be paid to woman; but it disgraces a man, because
God, the Creator, placed this characteristic within the heart and soul
and nature, just as he gave a difference of nature, mould, and form,
to the outward appearance of man and woman. He made them for a
particular purpose, and not for the same purpose. They were not made
in the same manner, nor of the same material. If woman be the weaker
vessel, she is of the finer mould. God made man in his own image, and
woman was created to be his helpmeet.
3. We have noticed the change in the relations which was the product
of the curse. Woman in Eden was the source of influence. After it, man
became the head, and her desire was unto him.
4. Since the fall, labor has been multiplied to man, sorrow to woman;
but such is the kindness of God, that these two facts are sources of
perpetual joy in the home. The wife is proud of her toiling husband,
the man is tender of his suffering wife; and in the bliss of childhood
happiness both find their reward.
These statements shrine all the facts of the separate histories of man
and woman. It were easier to change earth to water, and sea to land,
than it is to make a womanly woman consent to appear manly. Her God
made her a woman. It is not a fault. It is a glory. The bird that
skims the wave would not exchange places with the bird that goes to
meet the sun; but this is not to bring a charge against the eagle or
the swan.
One more truth, and then we will pass to the consideration of
the lessons discoverable in woman's nature. All the Scripture
requirements, such as refer to the plaiting of the hair, to being
uncovered in public, are said to refer to the customs of the East, and
not to bind woman in this age of progress. The principle covered by
those requirements then, rules now. Paul said, Let not a Christian
woman break through any of the restraints of womanhood, and so appear
as do the harlots, with uncovered faces and with plaited hair, who
mingle freely with men, and are shorn of that modesty and weakness so
becoming woman. Woman's right to be a woman implies the right to be
loved, to be respected as a woman, to be married, to bring forth to
the world the product of that love; and woman's highest interests are
promoted by defending and maintaining this right.
There are those who object to the word _service_, and claim that those
who take the Bible as authority wish to reduce woman to slavery. No
charge could be more absurd; and God's care for woman is manifest,
both in the teachings of the Bible and in the constitution of the
race. Woman owes to Christianity all she enjoys. Leave her to be
subject to the conditions imposed on her by unregenerated manhood or
womanhood, and you leave her to become either a thing in society, or
else reduce her to a level with the beasts of burden. In old savage
and pagan tribes the severest burdens of physical toil were laid upon
her. She was valued for the same reason that men prize their most
useful animals, or as a means of gratifying sensual and selfish
desires. Even in the learned and dignified forms of modern paganism,
the wife is the slave rather than the companion of her husband. She
is kept apart from him. The education of her mental faculties is
neglected. She is not allowed to walk with him; she must walk behind
him. She must not eat with him, but eat after he has done, and eat
what _he leaves_. She must not sleep until he is asleep, nor remain
asleep after he is awake. If she is sitting down, and he comes into
the room, she must rise up. She must bow to no other god on the earth
besides her husband. She must worship him while he lives, and when he
dies she must be burned with him. In case she is not burned, she is
not allowed to marry, and is considered an outcast. There is little
social intercourse between the sexes, little or no acquaintance of the
parties before marriage, and, consequently, little mutual attachment.
Women are not allowed to learn to read, because there can be no solid
foundation laid for future influence.
Under the Crescent the condition of woman is worse rather than better,
for in pagan India she is permitted to share in the hope of religion;
but in Mohammedan countries it is a popular tradition that women are
forbidden paradise; and it requires some effort for the imagination to
conceive how debased and wretched must be the condition of the
female sex to originate and sustain such a horrible and blasphemous
tradition.
Even in the refined and shining ages of Greece and Rome, where the
cultivation of letters and the graces of polished style, the charms
of poetry and eloquence, the elegances of architecture, sculpture,
painting, and embroidery, the glory of conquest and the pride of
national distinction, were unsurpassed,--even then and there, woman
was but the abject slave of man, the object of his ambition, avarice,
lust, and power.
Truly has it been said that nothing more surely distinguishes the
savage state from the civilized, the East from the West, Paganism from
Christianity, antiquity from the middle ages, the middle ages from
modern times, than the condition of woman.
In China, she is used as a beast of burden. The Chinese peasant woman
goes to the field with her male infant on her back, and ploughs, sows,
and reaps, exposed to all the changes of the weather. In Calcutta,
women are the masons, and maybe seen daily conveying their hods of
cement, and spreading it on the tops of their houses.
In a country where no European man can labor, where the native rests
until compelled by his conqueror to work, seven thousand of these
women might have been seen, in 1859, climbing to the edge of ravines,
with baskets of stone on their heads, to fill, with these tedious
contributions, thousands of perpendicular feet, in order that a
railroad might wind among the mountains.
In Australia, she carries the burden which man's indolence refuses;
and in Great Britain, the condition of women among the lower classes,
revealed by the statistics of her mines and of her manufacturing
districts, is such as to make a moralist blush. Behold her, with a
strap around her waist, dragging the coal-cart in the mine, and so
ignorant, that when asked if she knew Jesus, replied, "He never worked
in our shaft."
Do we turn to America, we find that in the providence of God her
fortune has been advanced and improved by the extension of the era of
free government, and by the diffusion of the principles of the gospel
of Christ.
True, in the past, throughout the South, a negro woman worked in the
field as a beast of burden; but emancipation and the diffusion of the
principles of Christianity changes all this in the South, as it has
changed it in Turkey and in the East. The colored man builds for his
wife a house, and toils for her in the field or shop, while she keeps
the house, and beautifies the sanctuary of the heart.
Now, in all this land, woman's right to be a woman is recognized, and
"woman's right to be a man" is opposed, though eloquent orators of
either sex may declaim in its behalf. God's law, natural and revealed,
is against it. Woman's nature will be woman's nature no longer when
she shall desire it.
An illustration of this fact was recently furnished. A female orator
had just left the platform for the horse-car. She was tired, and,
doubtless, needed a seat. She had been speaking in favor of woman's
rights, and had berated the opposite sex for their unwillingness to
grant them. Worn out with fatigue, and excited, her lace red, her eyes
flashing, she looked around for a seat. The car was full, and among
the number sitting down was a workingman.
She spoke so that all could hear her, saying, "You are not gentlemen,
or you would not let a woman stand." The workingman looked up, and
replied, "Did I not just hear you speak in behalf of woman's
rights?" The woman, supposing she had found a friend, replied in
the affirmative. "Well," said he, "I will stand up any time, with
pleasure, for a housewife or a kitchen girl; but you contend for an
equality of rights with men; take it, and stand up among them." The
shout of approbation proved that the argument was not on the side of
woman. She did not herself believe in the theory advanced. Down in her
heart she felt that, because she was a woman, she was entitled to be
treated with love and respect, with honor and consideration.
The right which exempts her from certain things which men must endure,
_grows out of her right to be a woman_. We feel that it is her
privilege and her right to be relieved from the necessity of working
in the field, from doing many things which it is manly in man to do.
We do not object to woman's sharing in the toil of the store, the
shop, or the factory. Better this than idleness and want; yet there is
a reason for pondering the question whether woman is wise in trying to
displace man for her own advantage. If any one must be idle, let it be
woman, and not man. It has been well said, "There are in Massachusetts
over seventy thousand more females than males, and probably twice
that number in the State of New York. It is an unnatural condition of
things. At the West the number of men greatly preponderates."
"Our young men go off early in life, leaving fathers, mothers, and
sisters behind them. The prospect for their sisters to marry, then, is
lessened by every emigration." Now, what shall be done in behalf of
these thousands of virtuous, educated, and noble girls? The cry is,
make them into clerks, and bookkeepers, and bankers, and give them all
the employments of men. Think it over. Suppose now we make these
girls into clerks in stores and counting-rooms, say ten thousand in
Massachusetts, and twenty thousand in New York--don't we displace
so many young men; drive them off to the West; prevent so many new
families from being established here; take away thirty thousand
chances of marriage from these females, and enhance the evil we are
trying to remedy?
Is it a blessing to woman to lessen her opportunities of marriage?
Again, a woman can be idle, and not be lost. Whereas man, if left
unemployed, runs to mischief, if not to crime.
The history of those manufacturing districts in England, so eloquently
described by Charlotte Elizabeth, where woman is preferred because of
the cheapness and skill of her labor, proves this position correct.
The husband lives in idleness, and has the care of the house. The
result is, that comfort and neatness are at an end. The children are
reared in crime, in indolence; the men pass their time in drinking and
in gambling, prostitution abounds, and the health of the community,
socially, physically, mentally, and morally, is destroyed.
On the other hand, enter one of those manufacturing towns where the
skilled labor of man is rewarded, and where women keep the house with
thrift and care, and you behold order, virtue, and prosperity. This is
not poetry. It is fact. It proves that God's laws must be heeded and
obeyed. "Marriage," said Gail Hamilton, "is a friendship of the sexes
so profound, so comprehensive, that it includes the whole being. The
inflow of the divine life,
"'Bright effluence of bright essence increate,'
"blends the man nature and the woman nature into an absolute oneness,
which shapes itself ever thereafter into the only perfect symmetry.
Thus alone comes humanity in the unity of the faith, and of the
knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of
the stature of the fulness of Christ. Thus marriage forever tends to
its own annihilation,--not the annihilation of a stream swallowed up
in desert sands, but of a river broadening to the boundless sea. The
more perfect its substance, the more yielding its form. As it gathers
power it diminishes pomp, till, by a pathway which the vulture's eye
hath not seen and never can see, marriage itself leads to the land
where they neither marry nor are given in marriage.
"Wherever man pays reverence to woman,--wherever any man feels the
influence of any woman, purifying, chastening, abashing, strengthening
him against temptation, shielding him from evil, ministering to his
self-respect, medicining his weariness, peopling his solitude, winning
him from sordid prizes, enlivening his monotonous days with mirth, or
fancy, or wit, flashing heaven upon his earth, and mellowing it for
all spiritual fertility,--there is the element of marriage. Wherever
woman pays reverence to man,--wherever any woman rejoices in the
strength of any man, feels it to be God's agent, upholding her
weakness, confirming her purpose, and crowning her power,--wherever
he reveals himself to her, just, upright, inflexible, yet tolerant,
merciful, benignant, not unruffled, perhaps, but not overcome by the
world's turbulence, and responding to all her gentleness, his feet
on the earth, his head among the stars, helping her to hold her
soul steadfast in right, to stand firm against the encroachments of
frivolity, vanity, impatience, fatigue, and discouragement, helping to
preserve her good nature, to develop her energy, to consolidate
her thought, to utilize her benevolence, to exalt and illumine her
life,--there is the essence of marriage. Its love is founded on
respect, and increases self-respect at the very moment of merging
itself in another. Its love is mutual, equally giving and receiving
at every instant of its action. There is neither dependence nor
independence, but inter-dependence. Years cannot weaken its bonds,
distance cannot sunder them. It is a love which vanquishes the grave,
and transfigures death itself into life."
These laws are varied by God's word, and written indelibly upon the
nature of man. Surely nothing can be more manifest than that they must
be obeyed.
II.
_Nature teaches us the Wisdom of adhering to the Divine Plan_.
Anatomists tell us that in the embryo skeleton there is a marked
difference of general conformation in the two sexes; that in the male
there is a larger chest and breathing apparatus, which, affects the
whole organization, forming a more powerful muscular system, and
producing a physical constitution which predestines him to bold
enterprises and daring exploits. The woman, being differently
constructed, finds it natural to content herself in the house, removed
from the gaze of the world, and from rude contact with its jostling
cares.
There is an outside and an inside world. The work of the street, or
the shop, or the field, is no more essential to the well-being of the
family than is the work performed in the house. God assigned to man
the field, or out-door work, and to woman the home and housework. In
proportion as men and women fill well their separate spheres, there is
harmony and happiness. Man toils, and provides for the wants of his
household. Woman toils, and sees to it that the children are well
reared, and that the house is well kept. Woman is respected and
supported, not in idleness, but in caring for the wants of those
committed to her care. The attempt is being made to disregard these
natural laws, by those who claim to have outgrown divine legislation,
and who have the hardihood to trample upon the laws of nature. But in
vain. When God made our first parents, he made them male and female,
and it will not be difficult to believe in the impossibility of the
finite being able to undo the work of the Infinite. Each has his and
her place, and nothing goes continuously right if husband and wife
change places. Keep the positions assigned them by the laws of God and
nature, and all will go well.
Give to woman the serious consideration due from every man born of
woman's agony, and you build her up in love, endow her with respect,
encourage her to cultivate her mind, and to develop the graces of her
nature. The mightiest influence which exists upon earth is concealed
in the heart of woman. It follows that her elevation and her
happiness, her education and usefulness, are objects of deep concern.
We have seen that the legislation of Heaven provides for the
gratification of the early longing of the soul for companionship in
making marriage honorable and love the holiest of instincts.
It is fashionable to talk against an early love. It is wrong thus to
do. "Youth longeth for a kindred spirit, and yearneth for a heart that
can commune with his own. He meditateth night and day, doting on the
image of his fancy." It is the tendency of an early love to inspire
youth with grand aspirations and lofty aims. "They that love early,
shall become like-minded, and the tempter shall touch them not. They
shall grow up, leaning on each other, as the olive and the vine."
It is only when love is scorned, when passion takes its place, when
man forgets that the idol of his heart is a probationer of earth like
himself, that it is his duty to be chary of her soul, feeling that it
is his jewel. It is only when a man ceases to be a man, and becomes a
beast, that he can consent, even in thought, to despoil woman of her
virtue; to trample upon the sacred instincts of her nobler nature.
A real woman will delight to make herself worthy of love. In the
advancement of her mind, quite as much as in the adornment of her
person, she strives to make herself beautiful as well as lovable. If
she forgets her duty, and consents to seem to be what she is not, so
that her admirer finds that the appearance which charmed him was not
real, then the future of that woman is dark indeed. Her husband will
discover, when too late, that "the harp and the voice may thrill him,
sound may enchant his ear, but, by and by, the hand will wither, and
the sweet notes turn to discord; the eye, so brilliant at even, may be
red with sorrow in the morning; and the sylph-like form of elegance
must writhe in the crampings of pain."
Naturally the man and woman will recognize the rule of God in the
choice of their vocation. He will go abroad, and she will stay at
home. He will earn the bread, and she will make it. He will build the
house, and she will keep it. The difference between their spheres of
labor seems naturally to be this: one is external, the other internal;
one active, the other passive. He has to go and seek out his path;
hers usually lies close under her feet. Yet, if life is meant to be a
worthy one, each must resolutely be trod.
"When the man wants weight, the woman takes it up,
And topples down the scales; but this is fixt
As are the roots of earth and base of all:
Man for the field, and woman for the hearth;
Man for the sword, and for the needle she;
Man with the head, and woman with the heart;
Man to command, and woman to obey;
All else confusion."
Woman is not content to remain separate and apart. She will give her
love to some object, and desires to repose her faith in some person
worthy of her regard. She lives for man. She dresses and studies for
him. She acquires knowledge and accomplishments, which are known to
please and to allure.
Woman, being by nature dependent, finds it easier to lay hold of the
offer of salvation than does man. His independent spirit keeps him
back. Woman has only to recognize her dependence upon One higher than
man, and in doing this is obliged to do but little violence to
her habits of thought and feeling, and no violence at all to such
sentiments of independence as stand most in the way of man. Hence men
shrink with horror from coming in contact with a godless woman. In
their eyes she is monstrous, unreasonable and offensive. Even an
utterly godless man, unless he be debauched and debased to the
position of an animal, deems such a woman without an excuse. He looks
on her with suspicion. He would not intrust his children to her care.
Oh happy lot, and hallowed even as the joy of angels, where the golden
chain of godliness is entwined with the roses of love, as one of our
own poets wrote:--
"O, what is woman--what her smile,
Her lip of love, her eye of light;
What is she if her lip revile
The lowly Jesus? Love may write
His name upon her noble brow,
Or linger in her curls of jet;
The bright spring flowers may scarcely bow
Beneath her step, and yet, and yet
Without that meeker grace, she'll be
A lighter thing than vanity."
Thus wrote N.P. Willis. He felt that a woman, with Christ in her
heart, was the _beau ideal_ of man. The home is her kingdom, and
the heart of husband or brother is her throne. In that sphere her
influence is the most potent instrumentality on earth.
Demosthenes declared that by this influence she can in an hour upset
the legislation of a year of statesmanship. Her power is, however,
through man, not apart from him.
This is the scriptural view. Nowhere do we read of woman as though
she had a mission apart from man. We talk of men and forget women. It
seems almost impossible to legislate for woman and forget man.
Mankind includes womankind, but womankind does not include mankind.
It may not be complimentary, yet it remains true, that the Scriptures
fail to furnish us with a model woman.
Jesus was the model man; but Eve, and Mary, and Rebekah, and Rachel,
were model women to none besides those to whom they were given as
wives. This, perhaps, is well, for it would be injudicious to try and
prove to any man that his wife should differ radically from herself.
III.
_Having considered the teachings of the Scripture and of Nature, let
us listen to the Voice of Common Sense_.
Under this head we hesitate not to declare that the hope of woman lies
in the recognition of the laws of God, and the laws of her own higher
nature.
Look at the facts. Who demand the ballot for woman? They are not the
lovers of God, nor are they the believers in Christ, as a class. There
may be exceptions, but the majority prefer an infidel's cheer to the
favor of God and the love of the Christian community. It is because of
this tendency that the majority of those who contend for the ballot
for woman cut loose from the legislation of Heaven, from the
enjoyments of home, and drift to infidelity and ruin.
Our wives and mothers do not ask the ballot. Our young ladies do not
care even to hear the question discussed. They believe that whatever
hinders woman from being the helpmeet of man does her injury. It is
claimed that woman needs the ballot to secure equal laws. This claim
is urged, because, it is said, women are required to obey laws which
they had no share in making. It is a mistaken notion. Woman has had
a share in the legislation of the country. Her influence pervades
society. Let her be true to temperance, and intemperance is
restrained. Let her be true to freedom, and the pulsations of her
heart find their way through the entire framework of society. Let her
be true to her own glorious nature, and this attempt to unsex and
discrown her will meet with the swift and terrible condemnation it
deserves.
Another has said, "The Amazons have often been met with the statement,
that a large majority of the women do not wish to vote, and would
not if they could. The truth of this statement is not denied. The
advocates of the ballot confess that many noble women affect a womanly
horror of being thought strong-minded," and to offset this tendency
they declare it to be the "imperative duty of women to claim the
suffrage." "Does this mean that women are to be coerced in this
matter? that our mothers, wives, and sisters are to be punished for
staying away from the polls? We have never supposed it the imperative
duty of every man to vote. And we know that many of the most
intelligent and upright do not vote. Such is the inexpressible
nastiness of our elections, especially in the larger cities, that men
of the cleanest morals think it right to keep away from them. The
foulest portions of the men go first, stay longest, and stand thickest
at the places of voting. How then will it be when the foulest portion
of the women get packed into the same crowd, and drive modesty away by
the foulness of their speech and presence? When the aggregate filth of
both sexes shall have met together at the polling stations, as it will
be sure to do, we hardly think any chaste or modest home-loving woman
will go near this stench unless compelled to do so."
It is because this scheme lifts the gate to the increasing wave
of corruption and pollution, that we are surprised that so-called
statesmen give their countenance to it. Give to woman the ballot, and
this country is hopelessly given up to Romanism. The priest loses the
man, but he keeps the woman. Give to the priests the control of the
votes of the thousands of servants in the great cities, and there is
an end to legislation in behalf of the Sabbath, the Bible, and the
school system, temperance, or morality.
The right to vote implies the right to rule, to legislate, to go to
Congress, and to take the Presidential chair. On this point hear Miss
Muloch. "Who that ever listened for two hours to the verbose confused
inanities of a ladies' committee, would immediately go and give his
vote for a Female House of Congress, or of Commons? or who, on
the receipt of a lady's letter of business,--I speak of the
average,--would henceforth desire to have our courts of justice
stocked with matronly lawyers, or thronged by
"'Sweet girl graduates, with their golden hair?'"
Well has Gail Hamilton said, "How will the possession of the ballot
affect in any way the vexed question of work and wages? One orator
says, 'Shall Senators tell me in their places that I have no need of
the ballot, when forty thousand women in the city of New York alone
are earning their daily bread at starving prices with the needle?' But
what will the ballot do for those forty thousand women when they get
it? It will not give them husbands, nor make their thriftless husbands
provident, nor their invalid husbands healthy. They cannot vote
themselves out of their dark, unwholesome sewing-rooms into
counting-rooms and insurance offices, nor have they generally the
qualifications which these places require. _The ballot will not enable
them to do anything for which their constitution or their education
has not fitted them, and I do not know of any law now which prevents
them from doing anything for which they are fitted, except the holding
of government offices._ ... What can the ballot do towards equalizing
wages, where work is already equalized without affecting wages, as is
not unfrequently the case? There are shops of the same sort, on the
same street, with male clerks in one and female clerks in another,
where the former work fewer hours and receive higher wages than the
latter.... Moreover, the question of female clerkship is not
yet settled. There are conscientious, intelligent, and obliging
shopkeepers, who say that female clerks are not satisfactory. Their
strength is not equal to the draughts made upon it. They are not able
to stand so long as clerks are required to stand. They have not the
patience, the civility, the tact that male clerks have.... All the
voting in the world can never add a cubit to a woman's stature."
Woman is not naturally a law-maker. Even in our homes she desires
the head of the house to lay down the law. Never shall I forget the
influence exerted by the utterance in a convention of Sabbath school
teachers. A paper was read, complaining that in a certain Sabbath
school there was a lady superintendent, because no man could be found
to take the place. In conclusion, the writer said, "We need a man in
our town. We have things that wear pantaloons, but we need a man, to
give direction to the school, and to attract the nobler and better
portion of community." It was an honest declaration, and voiced a
truth. Every town, every Sabbath school, every home, needs a man.
Women of talent have tried to figure in politics and in the pulpit,
but a sorry figure they have made of it.
Think of Miss Anthony and Mrs. Stanton in the train of George Francis
Train, perambulating the country in favor of the ballot in Kansas.
These are the leaders; but let it not be forgotten that they
sided against the ballot for the negro in hopes of getting it for
themselves, and proved their utter worthlessness and untrustworthiness
by trailing the banner committed to their keeping in the slime of a
convention which went for the repudiation of the national debt, the
defeat of the party of progress, and for the overthrow of republican
liberty. Had woman possessed the ballot, and had the course pursued by
the leaders of this movement exercised an influence over the majority,
this wonderful victory over the rebellious spirits of the land had
not been achieved; but, in its stead, the stars and bars would have
resumed their sway, and the stars and stripes, which now kiss the
breeze, and greet the rising hopes of uncounted millions, would have
been furled in gloom and night.
It is claimed that the ballot will secure for woman social respect.
The claim is not well founded. Those who seek it lose social respect,
because they step out of the path marked out for them by Providence
and by Nature. Woman, in her sphere, is man's good angel and helpmeet;
out of it, she is man's bitterest foe and heaviest curse.
There is an instinctive respect for woman in her proper sphere, which
is of itself a power superior to any merely conventional position that
a woman can build up for herself by her own hands, even through the
aid of the ballot.
How natural to see woman waited on by man! Sir Walter Raleigh was
praised because he cast his cloak into the mud to save the foot of his
Queen from being soiled. As noble acts have been performed by many
men, times without number. The uprising of gentlemen in the cars when
a tired woman enters with a child; the disposition to lighten her
cares and sweeten her joys, is everywhere considered manly.
Education is essential for her. She is the educator of the home, for
she is its soul. If one must be ignorant, let it be the man, and not
the woman. Many of our most intelligent men have had cultured mothers.
Very few sons ever grew to be learned whose mothers cared not for
books. This fact is appreciated, and leads us naturally to conclude
that if woman lacks social respect it is her own fault. If a woman
prefers superficiality to thoroughness; music, drawing, and dress, to
a knowledge of housework, an acquaintance with literature, and the
endowments of common sense, simply because brainless men are disposed
to seek out the effeminate and the frail in preference to the rugged
and the well-endowed, then she must suffer the consequences. If a
young lady, compelled to toil for support, will prefer the factory or
the store, with its hot air and depressing associations, to work in
the home, because she hopes in the store or factory to secure the
hand and heart of a husband sooner than elsewhere, she must suffer
accordingly. But if woman will unite in securing a reform in this
direction,--if the pure and the virtuous will say, Such a life as is
offered me in the family is in harmony with my future well-being, and
I will scorn the allurements elsewhere held out, and fit myself, by
study, for companionship with the noble of the land, she will succeed.
If woman will respect herself, she will be respected.
It is not by clamoring for rights that have been conferred upon
others; it is not by restless discontent, by partisan appeals, by
stepping out of her God-given sphere, and by attempting to destroy the
network of holy influences by which he ever has surrounded her; it is
not by ridiculing marriage and casting scorn on motherhood, that she
is to obtain the blessings she courts, but by tranquilly laboring
under this heaven-imposed law of obedience. Woman's weakness is
transmuted into strength when she opens her nature to the influences
of love, and when she consecrates herself to the happiness of others.
Then it is she obtains a moral and spiritual power to which man
is glad to do homage. Ambition, pride, wilfulness, or any earthly
passion, will distort her being. She struggles all in vain against
a divine appointment. It is from the soul of meekness that the true
strength of womanhood is derived; and it is because it has its root in
such a soil that it has a growth so majestic, showering its blessing
and fruits upon the world.
It was the sun and the wind that in the fable strove for the mastery;
and the strife was for the traveller's cloak. The quiet moon had
nought to do with such fierce rivalry of the burning or the blast;
but as in her tranquil orbit she journeys round the world, she gently
sways the tides of the ocean. Woman's influence resembles that exerted
by the queen of night. In the conflicts of life she has little to do;
but her influence is felt from the cradle to the grave, and the sphere
of it is the whole region of humanity. Woman's worst enemy is he who
would cruelly lift her out of her sphere, and would try to reverse the
laws of God and of nature in her behalf. They deceive woman who cause
her to believe that she will find independence when she abandons the
position assigned her by her Creator, and reaches one against which
her nature, the interests of society, and the laws of God contend.
Woman has her sphere and her work, and she is only happy when she
finds pleasure in lovingly, patiently, and faithfully performing the
duties and enacting the relations that belong to her as woman. She is
not the natural head of society. Man, rough, stern, cold, and almost
nerveless, is made to be the head of human society; and woman, quick,
sensitive, pliant (as her name indicates), gentle, loving, is the
heart of the world. As the heart, she has power. She rules through
love, and finds the work set for her to do in the doors opening before
her loving nature. She rules through love, and becomes a blessing
greater than we can ever acknowledge, because it is greater than we
can measure. Let woman take heart. She is not in captivity. The law of
service is on her, as it is on man. Much of her service consists in
suffering; much of man's consists in toil. Before both there are
fields of endeavor, white with beckoning harvests. In literature, in
reforms, in ministering to the wants and woes of humanity, in making
home more and more like heaven, woman has an open door set before her,
which no man will desire to close. Let her enter it and work. There
is a law of companionship far deeper than that of uniformity and
equality, or similarity--the law which reconciles similitude and
dissimilitude, the harmony of contrast, in which what is wanting on
the one side finds its complement on the other; for,--
"Heart with heart and mind with mind,
When the main fibres are entwined,
Through Nature's skill,
May even by contraries be joined
More closely still."
Such was the exquisite companionship of the sexes as they were
represented by our first parents, and such, however they may be
momentarily disturbed, they will remain, as the ideal for all the
generations of men and women. Let woman repose her trust in man, and
then, lifting up her heart, she may sing,--
"Though God's high things are not all ours,
'Tis ours to look above;
All is not ours to have and hold,
But all is ours to love."
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