Read Ebook: The True Woman A Series of Discourses to Which Is Added Woman vs. Ballot by Fulton Justin D Justin Dewey

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The characteristics of woman as a helpmeet deserve our notice.

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.

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.

"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.

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."

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.

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.

"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.

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.

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.

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