INTELLECTUAL POWER OF WOMAN.
BY REV. S.W. FISHER.
There has been a long-standing dispute respecting the intellectual powers of the two sexes, and the consequent style of education suitable to each. Happily, the truth on this subject may be fully spoken, without obliging me to exalt the father at the expense of the mother, or ennoble man by denying the essential equality of woman. It is among the things settled by experience, that, equal or not equal in talents, woman, the moment she escapes from the despotism of brute force, and is suffered to unfold and exercise her powers in her own legitimate sphere, shares with man the sceptre of influence; and without presuming to wrest from him a visible authority, by the mere force of her gentle nature silently directs that authority, and so rules the world. She may not debate in the senate or preside at the bar—she may not read philosophy in the university or preach in the sanctuary—she may not direct the national councils or lead armies to battle; but there is a style of influence resulting from her peculiar nature which constitutes her power and gives it greatness. As the sexes were designed to fill different positions in the economy of life, it would not be in harmony with the manifestations of divine wisdom in all things else to suppose that the powers of each were not peculiarly fitted for their own appropriate sphere. Woman gains nothing—she always loses when she leaves her own sphere for that of man. When she forsakes the household and the gentler duties of domestic life for the labors of the field, the pulpit, the rostrum, the court-room, she always descends from her own bright station, and invariably fails to ascend that of man. She falls between the two; and the world gazes at her as not exactly a woman, not quite a man, perplexed in what category of natural history to classify her. This remark holds specially true as you ascend from savage to refined society, where the rights and duties of women have been most fully recognized and most accurately defined. Mind is not to be weighed in scales. It must be judged by its uses and its influence. And who that compasses the peculiar purpose of woman's life; who that understands the meaning of those good old Saxon words, mother, sister, wife, daughter; who that estimates aright the duties they involve, the influences they embody in giving character to all of human kind, will hesitate to place her intellect, with its quickness, delicacy and persuasiveness, as high in the scale of power as that of the father, husband and son? If we estimate her mind by its actual power of influence when she is permitted to fill to the best advantage her circle of action, we shall find a capacity for education equal to that of him who, merely in reference to the temporary relations of society, has been constituted her lord. If you look up into yonder firmament with your naked eye, the astronomer will point you to a star which shines down upon you single in rays of pure liquid light. But if you will ascend yon eminence and direct towards it that magnificent instrument which modern science has brought to such perfection of power, the same star will suddenly resolve itself into two beautiful luminaries, equal in brilliancy, equal in all stellar excellence, emitting rays of different and intensely vivid hues, yet so exactly correspondent to each other, and so embracing each other, and so mingling their various colors as to pour upon the unaided vision the pure, sparkling light of a single orb. So is it with man and woman. Created twofold, equal in all human attributes, excellence and influence, different but correspondent, to the eye of Jehovah the harmony of their union in life is perfect, and as one complete being that life streams forth in rays of light and influence upon society.