No. 5.
Limitations to sukkuaok.
885
will never loosen It sufllclcntly to have It
wrested from them. Let us see what
progress litis been made towards this goal.
In primitive times, as now in some bar
barous portions of the earth, woman ex.
isled solely to minister to man's happiness
and comfort. Relative to man she was of
some worth. Individually she was a
nonentity, having no rights of her own.
If her liege lord did the hunting and
fighting--and ofltimes not even this
much he had done his whole duty; but
she must bear the rest of life's burdon,
which generally amounted to the greater
part, without murmer or complaint, while
he reposed in the shade of the Banyan or
fig-tree. After lone ages it was discov
ered, by whom or in what manner I know
not, that woman, or at least some women,
possessed a sort of soul and feelings as
well as man. The discovery was, indeed, a
great one; for man, out of his great gen
erosity, began to treat woman with some
respect and to concede her a few of the
simpler rights, yet reserving to himself the
lion's share. However, during the past
century wonderful progress has been
made, and especially in this country, un
til but little remains for-them but the bal
lot, which would soon put them on abso
lute equality with men. They speak in
our pulpits, lecture halls and even in po
litical campaigns. They are allowed to
practice in some of our courts, to practice
medicine and, besides, many have gained
lasting reputations as authors. This
would seem strange and astonishing to
those of one and two centuries ago.
With such rapid advancement as this in
the past few itecades, what are we to ex
pect in the future? Alas! 1 am afraid we
will soon be compelled to chronicle the
sad fact that " we poor men" have been
out-gencraled by "weak woman." Sad,
indeed, it surely will appear to some, but
I fail to sec bow the equality of men and
women is to be such a dire calamity.
I use the term equally here simply in
the sense of equality of rights. A person
may have the right to do a certain thing,
yet that, is no sign that it will be done by
that person, unless he or she possesses the
requisite ability and power. Men and
women were placed on this earth, with
different natures and habits, for the pur.
pose of supplementing the efforts of each
other. A sorry condition of things
would exist, if the world contained men
alone and, I imagine, a still worse con
dition of affairs would rule, if women
were compelled to carry on matters with
out the aid of men. Men, in some respects,
are superior to women braver yet in
clined to be more brutal. Women too, in
some respects, far surpass the men more
timid yet possessing far finer and more
delicate sensibilities. But I cannot see
how this argues against the equal rights
of the two sexes. No, allow equality of
rights and in lime those best fitted tor po
sitions will fill them, whether they be
men or women, l say men mat tuts
thing is inevitable unless we cut off the
fountain education for all. As long as
women arc allowed to receive education,
and this too in politics, we are leaving the
fountain open and may it forever re
main open. So too, the more widely ed
ucation is diffused and the higher it is ad
vanced, man himself "grows in grace"
and, seeing the injustice he is perpetra
ting, concedes though ofltimes reluctant
ly right after right to woman.
Last summer some of our newspapers
attempted to make out that this move
ment had received a decided check, ba
sing their calculations upon the election
for this very purpose whether or no wo
men should be allowed the ballot in Col
orado. They were grandly mistaken in
their conclusions; for instead of darken
ing the horizon it only cleared away tho
clouds and established the fact that edu
cation will certainly bring this result
The plan was defeated, but Uow? By the
too great numbers of ignorant voters. I
think the carefully collected statistics
showed that, of the educated classes
about fivc-sixths voted for the movement,
while of the ignorant nearly, all voted
1