CHAPTER II.
ONE CAUSE OF THE SITUATION.—A PART OF "WOMAN'S MISSION" CONSIDERED.
The question, How may work and culture be combined? was recently submitted, in my hearing, to a highly intelligent lady. She answered with a sigh, "It can't be done. I've tried it; but, as things are now, it can't be done." By "as things are now" she meant, with the established ideas regarding dress, food, appearance, style, and the objects for which woman should spend her time and herself. Suppose we investigate the causes of the present state of things, which, as being a hinderance to culture, is to us so unsatisfactory. A little reflection will enable us to discover several. Chief among them all, I think, is one which may require close inspection before it is recognized to be such. It seems to me that the great underlying cause—the cause of all the other causes—is the want of insight, the unenlightemnent, which prevails concerning, not what woman's mission is, but the ways and means by which she is to accomplish it. Let us consider this.
Those who claim the right of defining it never can say often enough that the true, mission of woman is to train up her children rightly, and to make home happy; and no doubt we all agree with them. But have we, or have they, a full sense of what woman requires to fit her even for the first of these duties? Suppose a philosopher in disguise on a tour of observation from some distant isle or planet should favor us with a visit. He finds himself, we will say, on a spot not a hundred miles from New York or Boston or Chicago. Among the objects which attract his attention are the little children drawn along in their little chaises.
"Are these beautiful creatures of any value?" he asks of a bystander.
"Certainly. They are the hope of the country. They will grow up into men and women who will take our places."
"I suppose there is no danger of their growing up any other than the right kind of men and women, such as your country needs?"
"On the contrary, there is every danger. Evil influences surround them from their birth. These beautiful creatures have in them the possibilities of becoming mean, base, corrupt, treacherous, deceitful, cruel, false, revengeful; of becoming, in fact, unworthy and repulsive in many ways. Why, all our criminals, our drunkards, liars, thieves, burglars, murderers, were once innocent little children like these!"
"And whether these will become like those, or not, depends on chance?"
"Oh, no! It depends largely on training, especially on early training. Children are like wax to receive impressions, like marble to retain them."
"Are they constituted pretty nearly alike, so that the treatment which is best for one is best for all?"
"By no means. Even those in the same family are often extremely unlike. They have different temperaments, dispositions, propensities. Some require urging, others checking. Some do better with praise, others without; the same of blame. It requires thought and discernment to know what words to speak, how many to speak, and when to speak them. In fact, a child's nature is a piece of delicate, complex machinery, and each one requires a separate study; for, as its springs of action are concealed, the operator is liable at any time to touch the wrong one."
"And mistakes here will affect a child through its whole lifetime?"
"They will affect it through all eternity." "But who among you dare make these early impressions which are to be so enduring? Who are the operators on these delicate and complex pieces of mental machinery?"
"Oh! the mothers always have the care of the children. This is their mission,—the chief duty of their lives."
"But how judicious, how comprehensive, must be the course of education which will fit a person for such an office!"
"Do you think so? Hem! Well, it is not generally considered that a woman who is going to marry and settle down to family life needs much education."
"You mean, doubtless, that she only receives the special instruction which her vocation requires."
"Special instruction?"
"Yes. If woman's special vocation is the training of children, of course she is educated specially with a view to that vocation."
"Well, I never heard of such a kind of education. But here is one of our young mothers: she can tell you all about it."
We will suppose, now, that our philosopher is left with the young mother, who names over what she learned at the "institute."
"And the training of children—moral, intellectual, and physical—was no doubt made a prominent subject of consideration."
"Training of children? Oh, no! That would have been a curious kind of study."
"Where, then, were you prepared for the duties of your mission?"
"What mission do you mean?"
"Your mission of child-training."
"I had no preparation."
"No preparation? But are you acquainted with the different temperaments a child may have, and the different combinations of them? Are you competent to the direction and culture of the intellectual and moral nature? Have you skill to touch the hidden springs of action? Have you, thus uninstructed, the power, the knowledge, the wisdom, requisite for guiding that mighty force, a child's soul?"
"Alas! there is hardly a day that I do not feel my ignorance on all these points."
"Are there no sources from which knowledge may be obtained? There must be books written on these subjects."
"Possibly; but I have no time to read them."
"No time?—no time to prepare for your chief mission?"
"It is our mission only in print. In real life it plays an extremely subordinate part."
"What, then, in real life, is your mission?"
"Chiefly cooking and sewing."
"Your husband, then, does not share the common belief in regard to woman's chief duty."
"Oh, yes! I have heard him express it many a time; though I don't think he comprehends what a woman needs in order to do her duty by her children. But he loves them dearly. If one should die he would be heart-broken."
"Is it a common thing here for children to die?"
"I am grieved to say that nearly one-fourth die in infancy."
"And those who live,—do they grow up in full health and vigor?"
"Oh, indeed they do not! Why, look at our crowded hospitals! Look at the apothecaries' shops at almost, every corner. Look at the advertisements of medicines. Don't you think there's meaning in these, and a meaning in the long rows of five-story swell-front houses occupied by physicians, and a meaning in the people themselves? There's scarcely one of them but has some ailment."
"But is this matter of health subject to no laws?"
"The phrase, 'laws of health,' is a familiar one, but I don't know what those laws are." "Mothers, then, are not in the habit of teaching them to their children?"
"They are not themselves acquainted with them."
"Perhaps this astonishing ignorance has something to do with the fearful mortality among infants. Do not husbands provide their wives with books and other means of information on this subject?"
"Generally speaking, they do nothing of the kind."
"And does not the subject of hygienic laws, as applied to the rearing of children, come into the courses of study laid out for young women!"
"No, indeed. Oh, how I wish it had!—and those other matters you mentioned. I would give up every thing else I ever learned for the sake of knowing how to bring up my children, and how to keep them in health."
"The presidents and professors of your educational institutions,—do they share the common belief as to woman's mission?"
"Oh, yes! They all say that the chief business of woman is to train up her children."
(Philosopher's solo.)
"There seems to be blindness and stupidity somewhere among these people. From what they say of the difficulty of bringing up their children, it must take an archangel to do it rightly; still they do not think a woman who is married and settles down to family life needs much education! Moreover, in educating young women, that which is universally acknowledged to be the chief business of their lives receives not the least attention."
If our philosopher continued his inquiries into the manners and customs of our country, he must have felt greatly encouraged; for he would have found that it is only in this one direction that we show such blindness and stupidity. He would have found that in every other occupation we demand preparation. The individual who builds our ships, cuts our coats, manufactures our watches, superintends our machinery, takes charge of our cattle, our trees, our flowers, must know how, must have been especially prepared for his calling. It is only character-moulding, only shaping the destinies of immortal beings, for which we demand neither preparation nor a knowledge of the business. It is only of our children that we are resigned to lose nearly one-fourth by death, "owing to ignorance and injudicious nursery management." Were this rate of mortality declared to exist among our domestic animals, the community would be aroused at once.