WHAT DIANTHA DID
CHAPTER XIII.
ALL THIS.
They laid before her conquering feet
The spoils of many lands;
Their crowns shone red upon her head
Their scepters in her hands.
She heard two murmuring at night,
Where rose-sweet shadows rest;
And coveted the blossom red
He laid upon her breast.
When Madam Weatherstone shook the plentiful dust of Orchardina from her expensive shoes, and returned to adorn the more classic groves of Philadelphia, Mrs. Thaddler assumed to hold undisputed sway as a social leader.
The Social Leader she meant to be; and marshalled her forces to that end. She Patronized here, and Donated there; revised her visiting list with rigid exclusiveness; secured an Eminent Professor and a Noted Writer as visitors, and gave entertainments of almost Roman magnificence.
Her husband grew more and more restive under the rising tide of social exactions in dress and deportment; and spent more and more time behind his fast horses, or on the stock-ranch where he raised them. As a neighbor and fellow ranchman, he scraped acquaintance with Ross Warden, and was able to render him many small services in the process of settling.
Mrs. Warden remembered his visit to Jopalez, and it took her some time to rearrange him in her mind as a person of wealth and standing. Having so rearranged him, on sufficient evidence, she and her daughters became most friendly, and had hopes of establishing valuable acquaintance in the town. "It's not for myself I care," she would explain to Ross, every day in the week and more on Sundays, "but for the girls. In that dreadful Jopalez there was absolutely no opportunity for them; but here, with horses, there is no reason we should not have friends. You must consider your sisters, Ross! Do be more cordial to Mr. Thaddler."
But Ross could not at present be cordial to anybody. His unexpected good fortune, the freedom from hated cares, and chance to work out his mighty theories on the faithful guinea-pig, ought to have filled his soul with joy; but Diantha's cruel obstinacy had embittered his cup of joy. He could not break with her; she had not refused him, and it was difficult in cold blood to refuse her.
He had stayed away for two whole weeks, in which time the guinea-pigs nibbled at ease and Diantha's work would have suffered except for her mother's extra efforts. Then he went to see her again, miserable but stubborn, finding her also miserable and also stubborn. They argued till there was grave danger of an absolute break between them; then dropped the subject by mutual agreement, and spent evenings of unsatisfying effort to talk about other things.
Diantha and her mother called on Mrs. Warden, of course, admiring the glorious view, the sweet high air, and the embowered loveliness of the two ranch houses. Ross drew Diantha aside and showed her "theirs"—a lovely little wide-porched concrete cottage, with a red-tiled roof, and heavy masses of Gold of Ophir and Banksia roses.
He held her hand and drew her close to him.
He kissed her when they were safe inside, and murmured: "Come, darling—won't you come and be my wife?"
"I will, Ross—whenever you say—but—!" She would not agree to give up her work, and he flung away from her in reckless despair. Mrs. Warden and the girls returned the call as a matter of duty, but came no more; the mother saying that she could not take her daughters to a Servant Girls' Club.
And though the Servant Girls' Club was soon removed to its new quarters and Union House became a quiet, well-conducted hotel, still the two families saw but little of each other.
Mrs. Warden naturally took her son's side, and considered Diantha an unnatural monster of hard-heartedness.
The matter sifted through to the ears of Mrs. Thaddler, who rejoiced in it, and called upon Mrs. Warden in her largest automobile. As a mother with four marriageable daughters, Mrs. Warden was delighted to accept and improve the acquaintance, but her aristocratic Southern soul was inwardly rebellious at the ancestorlessness and uncultured moneyed pride of her new friend.
"If only Madam Weatherstone had stayed!" she would complain to her daughters. "She had Family as well as Wealth."
"There's young Mrs. Weatherstone, mother—" suggested Dora.
"A nobody!" her mother replied. "She has the Weatherstone money, of course, but no Position; and what little she has she is losing by her low tastes. She goes about freely with Diantha Bell—her own housekeeper!"
"She's not her housekeeper now, mother—"
"Well, it's all the same! She was! And a mere general servant before that! And now to think that when Ross is willing to overlook it all and marry her, she won't give it up!"
They were all agreed on this point, unless perhaps that the youngest had her inward reservations. Dora had always liked Diantha better than had the others.
Young Mrs. Weatherstone stayed in her big empty house for a while, and as Mrs. Warden said, went about frequently with Diantha Bell. She liked Mrs. Bell, too—took her for long stimulating rides in her comfortable car, and insisted that first one and then the other of them should have a bit of vacation at her seashore home before the winter's work grew too heavy.
With Mrs. Bell she talked much of how Diantha had helped the town.
"She has no idea of the psychic effects, Mrs. Bell," said she. "She sees the business, and she has a great view of all it is going to do for women to come; but I don't think she realizes how much she is doing right now for women here—and men, too. There were my friends the Pornes; they were 'drifting apart,' as the novels have it—and no wonder. Isabel was absolutely no good as a housekeeper; he naturally didn't like it—and the baby made it all the worse; she pined for her work, you see, and couldn't get any time for it. Now they are as happy as can be—and it's just Diantha Bell's doings. The housework is off Isabel's shoulders.
"Then there are the Wagrams, and the Sheldons, and the Brinks—and ever so many more—who have told me themselves that they are far happier than they ever were before—and can live more cheaply. She ought to be the happiest girl alive!"
Mrs. Bell would agree to this, and quite swelled with happiness and pride; but Mrs. Weatherstone, watching narrowly, was not satisfied.
When she had Diantha with her she opened fire direct. "You ought to be the happiest, proudest, most triumphant woman in the world!" she said. "You're making oodles of money, your whole thing's going well, and look at your mother—she's made over!"
Diantha smiled and said she was happy; but her eyes would stray off to the very rim of the ocean; her mouth set in patient lines that were not in the least triumphant.
"Tell me about it, my friend," said her hostess. "Is it that he won't let you keep on with the business?"
Diantha nodded.
"And you won't give it up to marry him?"
"No," said Diantha. "No. Why should I? I'd marry him—to-morrow!"
She held one hand with the other, tight, but they both shook a little.
"I'd be glad to. But I will not give up my work!"
"You look thin," said Mrs. Weatherstone.
"Yes—"
"Do you sleep well?"
"No—not very."
"And I can see that you don't eat as you ought to. Hm! Are you going to break down?"
"No," said Diantha, "I am not going to break down. I am doing what is right, and I shall go on. It's a little hard at first—having him so near. But I am young and strong and have a great deal to do—I shall do it."
And then Mrs. Weatherstone would tell her all she knew of the intense satisfaction of the people she served, and pleasant stories about the girls. She bought her books to read and such gleanings as she found in foreign magazines on the subject of organized house-service.
Not only so, but she supplied the Orchardina library with a special bibliography on the subject, and induced the new Woman's Club to take up a course of reading in it, so that there gradually filtered into the Orchardina mind a faint perception that this was not the freak of an eccentric individual, but part of an inevitable business development, going on in various ways in many nations.
As the winter drew on, Mrs. Weatherstone whisked away again, but kept a warm current of interest in Diantha's life by many letters.
Mr. Bell came down from Jopalez with outer reluctance but inner satisfaction. He had rented his place, and Susie had three babies now. Henderson, Jr., had no place for him, and to do housework for himself was no part of Mr. Bell's plan.
In Diantha's hotel he had a comfortable room next his wife's, and a capacious chair in the firelit hall in wet weather, or on the shaded piazza in dry. The excellent library was a resource to him; he found some congenial souls to talk with; and under the new stimulus succeeded at last in patenting a small device that really worked. With this, and his rent, he felt inclined to establish a "home of his own," and the soul of Mrs. Bell sank within her. Without allowing it to come to an issue between them, she kept the question open for endless discussion; and Mr. Bell lived on in great contentment under the impression that he was about to move at almost any time. To his friends and cronies he dilated with pride on his daughter's wonderful achievements.
"She's as good as a boy!" he would declare. "Women nowadays seem to do anything they want to!" And he rigidly paid his board bill with a flourish.
Meanwhile the impressive gatherings at Mrs. Thaddler's, and the humbler tea and card parties of Diantha's friends, had a new topic as a shuttlecock.
A New York company had bought one of the largest and finest blocks in town—the old Para place—and was developing it in a manner hitherto unseen. The big, shabby, neglected estate began to turn into such a fairyland as only southern lands can know. The old live-oaks were untouched; the towering eucalyptus trees remained in ragged majesty; but an army of workmen was busy under guidance of a master of beauty.
One large and lovely building rose, promptly dubbed a hotel by the unwilling neighbors; others, smaller, showed here and there among the trees; and then a rose-gray wall of concrete ran around the whole, high, tantalizing, with green boughs and sweet odors coming over it. Those who went in reported many buildings, and much activity. But, when the wall was done, and each gate said "No admittance except on business," then the work of genii was imagined, and there was none to contradict.
It was a School of Theosophy; it was a Christian Science College; it was a Free-Love Colony; it was a Secret Society; it was a thousand wonders.
"Lot of little houses and one big one," the employees said when questioned.
"Hotel and cottages," the employers said when questioned.
They made no secret of it, they were too busy; but the town was unsatisfied. Why a wall? What did any honest person want of a wall? Yet the wall cast a pleasant shadow; there were seats here and there between buttresses, and, as the swift California season advanced, roses and oleanders nodded over the top, and gave hints of beauty and richness more subtly stimulating than all the open glory of the low-hedged gardens near.
Diantha's soul was stirred with secret envy. Some big concern was about to carry out her dream, or part of it—perhaps to be a huge and overflowing rival. Her own work grew meantime, and flourished as well as she could wish.
The food-delivery service was running to its full capacity; the girls got on very well under Mrs. Jessup, and were delighted to have a house of their own with the parlors and piazzas all to themselves, and a garden to sit in as well. If this depleted their ranks by marriage, it did not matter now, for there was a waiting list in training all the time.
Union House kept on evenly and profitably, and Diantha was beginning to feel safe and successful; but the years looked long before her.
She was always cheered by Mrs. Weatherstone's letters; and Mrs. Porne came to see her, and to compare notes over their friend's success. For Mrs. Weatherstone had been presented at Court—at more than one court, in fact; and Mrs. Weatherstone had been proposed to by a Duke—and had refused him! Orchardina well-nigh swooned when this was known.
She had been studying, investigating, had become known in scientific as well as social circles, and on her way back the strenuous upper layer of New York Society had also made much of her. Rumors grew of her exquisite costumes, of her unusual jewels, of her unique entertainments, of her popularity everywhere she went.
Other proposals, of a magnificent nature, were reported, with more magnificent refusals; and Orchardina began to be very proud of young Mrs. Weatherstone and to wish she would come back.
She did at last, bringing an Italian Prince with her, and a Hoch Geborene German Count also, who alleged they were travelling to study the country, but who were reputed to have had a duel already on the beautiful widow's account.
All this was long-drawn gossip but bore some faint resemblance to the facts. Viva Weatherstone at thirty was a very different woman front the pale, sad-eyed girl of four years earlier. And when the great house on the avenue was arrayed in new magnificence, and all Orchardina—that dared—had paid its respects to her, she opened the season, as it were, with a brilliant dinner, followed by a reception and ball.
All Orchardina came—so far as it had been invited. There was the Prince, sure enough—a pleasant, blue-eyed young man. And there was the Count, bearing visible evidence of duels a-plenty in earlier days. And there was Diantha Bell—receiving, with Mrs. Porne and Mrs. Weatherstone. All Orchardina stared. Diantha had been at the dinner—that was clear. And now she stood there in her soft, dark evening dress, the knot of golden acacias nestling against the black lace at her bosom, looking as fair and sweet as if she had never had a care in her life.
Her mother thought her the most beautiful thing she had ever seen; and her father, though somewhat critical, secretly thought so, too.
Mrs. Weatherstone cast many a loving look at the tall girl beside her in the intervals of "Delighted to see you's," and saw that her double burden had had no worse effect than to soften the lines of the mouth and give a hint of pathos to the clear depths of her eyes.
The foreign visitors were much interested in the young Amazon of
Industry, as the Prince insisted on calling her; and even the German
Count for a moment forgot his ancestors in her pleasant practical talk.
Mrs. Weatherstone had taken pains to call upon the Wardens—claiming a connection, if not a relationship, and to invite them all. And as the crowd grew bigger and bigger, Diantha saw Mrs. Warden at last approaching with her four daughters—and no one else. She greeted them politely and warmly; but Mrs. Weatherstone did more.
Holding them all in a little group beside her, she introduced her noble visitors to them; imparted the further information that their brother was fiance to Miss Bell. "I don't see him," she said, looking about. "He will come later, of course. Ah, Miss Madeline! How proud you all must feel of your sister-in-law to be!"
Madeline blushed and tried to say she was.
"Such a remarkable young lady!" said the Count to Adeline. "You will admire, envy, and imitate! Is it not so?"
"Your ladies of America have all things in your hands," said the Prince to Miss Cora. "To think that she has done so much, and is yet so young—and so beautiful!"
"I know you're all as proud as you can be," Mrs. Weatherstone continued to Dora. "You see, Diantha has been heard of abroad."
They all passed on presently, as others came; but Mrs. Warden's head was reeling. She wished she could by any means get at Ross, and make him come, which he had refused to do.
"I can't, mother," he had said. "You go—all of you. Take the girls.
I'll call for you at twelve—but I won't go in."
Mr. and Mrs. Thaddler were there—but not happy. She was not, at least, and showed it; he was not until an idea struck him. He dodged softly out, and was soon flying off, at dangerous speed over the moon-white country roads.
He found Ross, dressed and ready, sulking blackly on his shadowy porch.
"Come and take a spin while you wait," said Mr. Thaddler.
"Thanks, I have to go in town later."
"I'll take you in town."
"Thank you, but I have to take the horses in and bring out my mother and the girls."
"I'll bring you all out in the car. Come on—it's a great night."
So Ross rather reluctantly came.
He sat back on the luxurious cushions, his arms folded sternly, his brows knit, and the stout gentleman at his side watched him shrewdly.
"How does the ranch go?" he asked.
"Very well, thank you, Mr. Thaddler."
"Them Chinks pay up promptly?"
"As prompt as the month comes round. Their rent is a very valuable part of the estate."
"Yes," Mr. Thaddler pursued. "They have a good steady market for their stuff. And the chicken man, too. Do you know who buys 'em?"
Ross did not. Did not greatly care, he intimated.
"I should think you'd be interested—you ought to—it's Diantha Bell."
Ross started, but said nothing.
"You see, I've taken a great interest in her proposition ever since she sprung it on us," Mr. Thaddler confided. "She's got the goods all right. But there was plenty against her here—you know what women are! And I made up my mind the supplies should be good and steady, anyhow. She had no trouble with her grocery orders; that was easy. Meat I couldn't handle—except indirectly—a little pressure, maybe, here and there." And he chuckled softly. "But this ranch I bought on purpose."
Ross turned as if he had been stung.
"You!" he said.
"Yes, me. Why not? It's a good property. I got it all fixed right, and then I bought your little upstate shop—lock, stock and barrel—and gave you this for it. A fair exchange is no robbery. Though it would be nice to have it all in the family, eh?"
Ross was silent for a few turbulent moments, revolving this far from pleasing information.
"What'd I do it for?" continued the unasked benefactor. "What do you think I did it for? So that brave, sweet little girl down here could have her heart's desire. She's established her business—she's proved her point—she's won the town—most of it; and there's nothing on earth to make her unhappy now but your pigheadedness! Young man, I tell you you're a plumb fool!"
One cannot throw one's host out of his own swift-flying car; nor is it wise to jump out one's self.
"Nothing on earth between you but your cussed pride!" Mr. Thaddler remorselessly went on. "This ranch is honestly yours—by a square deal. Your Jopalez business was worth the money—you ran it honestly and extended the trade. You'd have made a heap by it if you could have unbent a little. Gosh! I limbered up that store some in twelve months!" And the stout man smiled reminiscently.
Ross was still silent.
"And now you've got what you wanted—thanks to her, mind you, thanks to her!—and you ain't willing to let her have what she wants!"
The young man moistened his lips to speak.
"You ain't dependent on her in any sense—I don't mean that. You earned the place all right, and I don't doubt you'll make good, both in a business way and a scientific way, young man. But why in Hades you can't let her be happy, too, is more'n I can figure! Guess you get your notions from two generations back—and some!"
Ross began, stumblingly. "I did not know I was indebted to you, Mr.
Thaddler."
"You're not, young man, you're not! I ran that shop of yours a year—built up the business and sold it for more than I paid for this. So you've no room for heroics—none at all. What I want you to realize is that you're breaking the heart of the finest woman I ever saw. You can't bend that girl—she'll never give up. A woman like that has got more things to do than just marry! But she's pining for you all the same.
"Here she is to-night, receiving with Mrs. Weatherstone—with those Bannerets, Dukes and Earls around her—standing up there like a Princess herself—and her eyes on the door all the time—and tears in 'em, I could swear—because you don't come!"
*
They drew up with a fine curve before the carriage gate.
"I'll take 'em all home—they won't be ready for some time yet," said Mr. Thaddler. "And if you two would like this car I'll send for the other one."
Ross shook hands with him. "You are very kind, Mr. Thaddler," he said.
"I am obliged to you. But I think we will walk."
Tall and impressive, looking more distinguished in a six-year-old evening suit than even the Hoch Geborene in his uniform, he came at last, and Diantha saw him the moment he entered; saw, too, a new light in his eyes.
He went straight to her. And Mrs. Weatherstone did not lay it up against him that he had but the briefest of words for his hostess.
"Will you come?" he said. "May I take you home—now?"
She went with him, without a word, and they walked slowly home, by far outlying paths, and long waits on rose-bowered seats they knew.
The moon filled all the world with tender light and the orange blossoms flooded the still air with sweetness.
"Dear," said he, "I have been a proud fool—I am yet—but I have come to see a little clearer. I do not approve of your work—I cannot approve of it—but will you forgive me for that and marry me? I cannot live any longer without you?"
"Of course I will," said Diantha.
(To be continued)
THE GOOD MAN
A certain Good Man possessed many Virtues of character by right of inheritance, so that my Critical Friend remarked, "It is easy for him to be good."
Now the Good Man was by no means satisfied with his inherited virtues, and with Ceaseless Diligence and Long Effort he strove to acquire more, and in due season acquired them, abundantly, so that even my Critical Friend allowed these virtues were of some credit to him.
Nevertheless, being critical, he criticized the Good Man, to my grief and amazement.
"How can you criticize this Great White Soul?" I cried. "He has never committed a crime."
"Neither have you or I," interrupted my Critical Friend.
"He has never sinned," I continued, "he has not a single vice, he has not even a fault! And as to his Virtues!"
"What are his Virtues?" asked my Critical Friend.
Then I considered the Virtues of that Great Man and was lost in admiration and amazement. "He is unimpeachably Honest, Trustworthy and True," said I. "He is Humble and Modest even in his Superiority, and has Hope of Improvement; he is Brave in meeting adversity and Patient in bearing it. He is Chaste and Temperate, he is Generous and Unselfish and Self-sacrificing, he is Persevering and Diligent, Faithful and Enduring. He is good."
"Yes?" said my Critical Friend. "What good is he?"
"What good?" said I.
"Yes, what good? What does he do?"
"What do you mean?" I asked. "His business?"
"Of course. What's his business? What does he do in the world?"
"He's a business man," said I, "and a very good business man, if that is what you mean."
My Critical friend grinned unfeelingly. "What use is he?" he asked. "Whom does he serve? Of what use to humanity is his work? In what may the human race be benefited by his business? What will the world lose when he is gone?"
"They will lose a Good Man," said I, a little angrily.
And my Critical Friend subsided, merely grunting once more, in that tiresome way of his, "What good?"
OUR ANDROCENTRIC CULTURE; OR, THE MAN-MADE WORLD
XIII.
INDUSTRY AND ECONOMICS.
The forest of Truth, on the subject of industry and economics, is difficult to see on account of the trees.
We have so many Facts on this subject; so many Opinions; so many Traditions and Habits; and the pressure of Immediate Conclusions is so intense upon us all; that it is not easy to form a clear space in one's mind and consider the field fairly.
Possibly the present treatment of the subject will appeal most to the minds of those who know least about it; such as the Average Woman. To her, Industry is a daylong and lifelong duty, as well as a natural impulse; and economics means going without things. To such untrained but also unprejudiced minds it should be easy to show the main facts on these lines.
Let us dispose of Economics first, as having a solemn scientific appearance.
Physical Economics treats of the internal affairs of the body; the whole machinery and how it works; all organs, members, functions; each last and littlest capillary and leucocyte, are parts of that "economy."
Nature's "economy" is not in the least "economical." The waste of life, the waste of material, the waste of time and effort, are prodigious, yet she achieves her end as we see.
Domestic Economics covers the whole care and government of the household; the maintenance of peace, health, order, and morality; the care and nourishment of children as far as done at home; the entire management of the home, as well as the spending and saving of money; are included in it. Saving is the least and poorest part of it; especially as in mere abstinence from needed things; most especially when this abstinence is mainly "Mother's." How best to spend; time, strength, love, care, labor, knowledge, and money—this should be the main study in Domestic Economics.
Social, or, as they are used to call it, Political Economics, covers a larger, but not essentially different field. A family consists of people, and the Mother is their natural manager. Society consists of people—the same people—only more of them. All the people, who are members of Society, are also members of families—except some incubated orphans maybe. Social Economics covers the whole care and management of the people, the maintenance of peace and health and order and morality; the care of children, as far as done out of the home; as well as the spending and saving of the public money—all these are included in it.
This great business of Social Economics is at present little understood and most poorly managed, for this reason; we approach it from an individual point of view; seeking not so much to do our share in the common service, as to get our personal profit from the common wealth. Where the whole family labors together to harvest fruit and store it for the winter, we have legitimate Domestic Economics: but where one member takes and hides a lot for himself, to the exclusion of the others, we have no Domestic Economics at all—merely individual selfishness.
In Social Economics we have a large, but simple problem. Here is the earth, our farm. Here are the people, who own the earth. How can the most advantage to the most people be obtained from the earth with the least labor? That is the problem of Social Economics.
Looking at the world as if you held it in your hands to study and discuss, what do we find at present?
We find people living too thickly for health and comfort in some places, and too thinly for others; we find most people working too hard and too long at honest labor; some people working with damaging intensity at dishonest labor; and a few wretched paupers among the rich and poor, degenerate idlers who do not work at all, the scum and the dregs of Society.
All this is bad economics. We do not get the comfort out of life we easily could; and work far too hard for what we do get. Moreover, there is no peace, no settled security. No man is sure of his living, no matter how hard he works, a thousand things may occur to deprive him of his job, or his income. In our time there is great excitement along this line of study; and more than one proposition is advanced whereby we may improve, most notably instanced in the world-covering advance of Socialism.
In our present study the principal fact to be exhibited is the influence of a male culture upon Social Economics and Industry.
Industry, as a department of Social Economics, is little understood. Heretofore we have viewed this field from several wholly erroneous positions. From the Hebrew (and wholly androcentric) religious teaching, we have regarded labor as a curse.
Nothing could be more absurdly false. Labor is not merely a means of supporting human life—it is human life. Imagine a race of beings living without labor! They must be the rudest savages.
Human work consists in specialized industry and the exchange of its products; and without it is no civilization. As industry develops, civilization develops; peace expands; wealth increases; science and art help on the splendid total. Productive industry, and its concomitant of distributive industry cover the major field of human life.
If our industry was normal, what should we see?
A world full of healthy, happy people; each busily engaged in what he or she most enjoys doing. Normal Specialization, like all our voluntary processes, is accompanied by keen pleasure; and any check or interruption to it gives pain and injury. Whosoever works at what he loves is well and happy. Whoso works at what he does not love is ill and miserable. It is very bad economics to force unwilling industry. That is the weakness of slave labor; and of wage labor also where there is not full industrial education and freedom of choice.
Under normal conditions we should see well developed, well trained specialists happily engaged in the work they most enjoyed; for reasonable hours (any work, or play either, becomes injurious if done too long); and as a consequence the whole output of the world would be vastly improved, not only in quantity but in quality.
Plain are the melancholy facts of what we do see. Following that pitiful conception of labor as a curse, comes the very old and androcentric habit of despising it as belonging to women, and then to slaves.
As a matter of fact industry is in its origin feminine; that is, maternal. It is the overflowing fountain of mother-love and mother-power which first prompts the human race to labor; and for long ages men performed no productive industry at all; being merely hunters and fighters.
It is this lack of natural instinct for labor in the male of our species, together with the ideas and opinions based on that lack, and voiced by him in his many writings, religious and other, which have given to the world its false estimate of this great function, human work. That which is our very life, our greatest joy, our road to all advancement, we have scorned and oppressed; so that "working people," the "working classes," "having to work," etc., are to this day spoken of with contempt. Perhaps drones speak so among themselves of the "working bees!"
Normally, widening out from the mother's careful and generous service in the family, to careful, generous service in the world, we should find labor freely given, with love and pride.
Abnormally, crushed under the burden of androcentric scorn and prejudice, we have labor grudgingly produced under pressure of necessity; labor of slaves under fear of the whip, or of wage-slaves, one step higher, under fear of want. Long ages wherein hunting and fighting were the only manly occupations, have left their heavy impress. The predacious instinct and the combative instinct weigh down and disfigure our economic development. What Veblen calls "the instinct of workmanship" grows on, slowly and irresistably; but the malign features of our industrial life are distinctively androcentric: the desire to get, of the hunter; interfering with the desire to give, of the mother; the desire to overcome an antagonist—originally masculine, interfering with the desire to serve and benefit—originally feminine.
Let the reader keep in mind that as human beings, men are able to over-live their masculine natures and do noble service to the world; also that as human beings they are today far more highly developed than women, and doing far more for the world. The point here brought out is that as males their unchecked supremacy has resulted in the abnormal predominance of masculine impulses in our human processes; and that this predominance has been largely injurious.
As it happens, the distinctly feminine or maternal impulses are far more nearly in line with human progress than are those of the male; which makes her exclusion from human functions the more mischievous.
Our current teachings in the infant science of Political Economy are naively masculine. They assume as unquestionable that "the economic man" will never do anything unless he has to; will only do it to escape pain or attain pleasure; and will, inevitably, take all he can get, and do all he can to outwit, overcome, and if necessary destroy his antagonist.
Always the antagonist; to the male mind an antagonist is essential to progress, to all achievement. He has planted that root-thought in all the human world; from that old hideous idea of Satan, "The Adversary," down to the competitor in business, or the boy at the head of the class, to be superseded by another.
Therefore, even in science, "the struggle for existence" is the dominant law—to the male mind, with the "survival of the fittest" and "the elimination of the unfit."
Therefore in industry and economics we find always and everywhere the antagonist; the necessity for somebody or something to be overcome—else why make an effort? If you have not the incentive of reward, or the incentive of combat, why work? "Competition is the life of trade."
Thus the Economic Man.
But how about the Economic Woman?
To the androcentric mind she does not exist. Women are females, and that's all; their working abilities are limited to personal service.
That it would be possible to develop industry to far greater heights, and to find in social economics a simple and beneficial process for the promotion of human life and prosperity, under any other impulse than these two, Desire and Combat, is hard indeed to recognize—for the "male mind."
So absolutely interwoven are our existing concepts of maleness and humanness, so sure are we that men are people and women only females, that the claim of equal weight and dignity in human affairs of the feminine instincts and methods is scouted as absurd. We find existing industry almost wholly in male hands; find it done as men do it; assume that that is the way it must be done.
When women suggest that it could be done differently, their proposal is waved aside—they are "only women"—their ideas are "womanish."
Agreed. So are men "only men," their ideas are "mannish"; and of the two the women are more vitally human than the men.
The female is the race-type—the man the variant.
The female, as a race-type, having the female processes besides; best performs the race processes. The male, however, has with great difficulty developed them, always heavily handicapped by his maleness; being in origin essentially a creature of sex, and so dominated almost exclusively by sex impulses.
The human instinct of mutual service is checked by the masculine instinct of combat; the human tendency to specialize in labor, to rejoicingly pour force in lines of specialized expression, is checked by the predacious instinct, which will exert itself for reward; and disfigured by the masculine instinct of self-expression, which is an entirely different thing from the great human outpouring of world force.
Great men, the world's teachers and leaders, are great in humanness; mere maleness does not make for greatness unless it be in warfare—a disadvantageous glory! Great women also must be great in humanness; but their female instincts are not so subversive of human progress as are the instincts of the male. To be a teacher and leader, to love and serve, to guard and guide and help, are well in line with motherhood.
"Are they not also in line with fatherhood?" will be asked; and, "Are not the father's paternal instincts masculine?"
No, they are not; they differ in no way from the maternal, in so far as they are beneficial. Parental functions of the higher sort, of the human sort, are identical. The father can give his children many advantages which the mother can not; but that is due to his superiority as a human being. He possesses far more knowledge and power in the world, the human world; he himself is more developed in human powers and processes; and is therefore able to do much for his children which the mother can not; but this is in no way due to his masculinity. It is in this development of human powers in man, through fatherhood, that we may read the explanation of our short period of androcentric culture.
So thorough and complete a reversal of previous relation, such continuance of what appears in every way an unnatural position, must have had some justification in racial advantages, or it could not have endured. This is its justification; the establishment of humanness in the male; he being led into it, along natural lines, by the exercise of previously existing desires.
In a male culture the attracting forces must inevitably have been, we have seen, Desire and Combat. These masculine forces, acting upon human processes, while necessary to the uplifting of the man, have been anything but uplifting to civilization. A sex which thinks, feels and acts in terms of combat is difficult to harmonize in the smooth bonds of human relationship; that they have succeeded so well is a beautiful testimony to the superior power of race tendency over sex tendency. Uniting and organizing, crudely and temporarily, for the common hunt; and then, with progressive elaboration, for the common fight; they are now using the same tactics—and the same desires, unfortunately—in common work.
Union, organization, complex interservice, are the essential processes of a growing society; in them, in the ever-increasing discharge of power along widening lines of action, is the joy and health of social life. But so far men combine in order to better combat; the mutual service held incidental to the common end of conquest and plunder.
In spite of this the overmastering power of humanness is now developing among modern men immense organizations of a wholly beneficial character, with no purpose but mutual advantage. This is true human growth, and as such will inevitably take the place of the sex-prejudiced earlier processes.
The human character of the Christian religion is now being more and more insisted on; the practical love and service of each and all; in place of the old insistence on Desire—for a Crown and Harp in Heaven, and Combat—with that everlasting adversary.
In economics this great change is rapidly going on before our eyes. It is a change in idea, in basic concept, in our theory of what the whole thing is about. We are beginning to see the world, not as "a fair field and no favor"—not a place for one man to get ahead of others, for a price; but as an establishment belonging to us, the proceeds of which are to be applied, as a matter of course, to human advantage.
In the old idea, the wholly masculine idea, based on the processes of sex-combat, the advantage of the world lay in having "the best man win." Some, in the first steps of enthusiasm for Eugenics, think so still; imagining that the primal process of promoting evolution through the paternity of the conquering male is the best process.
To have one superior lion kill six or sixty inferior lions, and leave a progeny of more superior lions behind him, is all right—for lions; the superiority in fighting being all the superiority they need.
But the man able to outwit his follows, to destroy them in physical, or ruin in financial, combat, is not therefore a superior human creature. Even physical superiority, as a fighter, does not prove the kind of vigor best calculated to resist disease, or to adapt itself to changing conditions.
That our masculine culture in its effect on Economics and Industry is injurious, is clearly shown by the whole open page of history. From the simple beneficent activities of a matriarchal period we follow the same lamentable steps; nation after nation. Women are enslaved and captives are enslaved; a military despotism is developed; labor is despised and discouraged. Then when the irresistible social forces do bring us onward, in science, art, commerce, and all that we call civilization, we find the same check acting always upon that progress; and the really vital social processes of production and distribution heavily injured by the financial combat and carnage which rages ever over and among them.
The real development of the people, the forming of finer physiques, finer minds, a higher level of efficiency, a broader range of enjoyment and accomplishment—is hindered and not helped by this artificially maintained "struggle for existence," this constant endeavor to eliminate what, from a masculine standard, is "unfit."
That we have progressed thus far, that we are now moving forward so rapidly, is in spite of and not because of our androcentric culture.
A FREQUENT QUESTION
If women become economically independent, their husbands will stop working—and depend on them.
Oh, no, they won't.
How do you know they won't?
Because that kind of man will not succeed in getting that kind of woman to depend on when women are wiser.
What's to prevent the man from becoming a burden on her afterward?
The marriage contract.
You propose a new kind of marriage contract, do you?
Why not? Marriages may be made in Heaven, but the contract is drawn up by mere men. These—and some women to help them—may easily make a better one. Why not?
BOYS WILL BE BOYS
"Boys will be boys," and boys have had their day;
Boy-mischief and boy-carelessness and noise
Extenuated all, allowed, excused and smoothed away,
Each duty missed, each damaging wild act,
By this meek statement of unquestioned fact—
Boys will be boys!
"Now, women will be women." Mark the change;
Calm motherhood in place of boisterous youth;
No warfare now; to manage and arrange,
To nurture with wise care, is woman's way,
In peace and fruitful industry her sway.
In love and truth.
MANY WINDOWS
Many minds are many windows,
Varied are their views;
Each of us, if lonely, knows
Only what one window shows—
Can no further choose.
Many minds are many windows,
One the light divine,
We may freely move and range,
Wide our windows may exchange,—
Come and look through mine!