It is impossible to judge as yet what may be the final outcome of the intellectual freedom now opened to all women. There are signs of what was the most probable immediate effect—the exaggeration of recoil from all ancient bonds, including those of religion and duty. Whilst it would be very short-sighted to suppose that such a state of things could ever be permanent, so long as women retain any remnant of the intuitional quality which is their special dower, it may still be seasonable to call special attention to the fact that the pioneers in the educational movement are, without exception, deeply religious women. This circumstance may or may not be an accident of no particular moment. The point is that it is historic fact, and as such has its own significance. In a quite special degree, we may point to Miss Davies and to Miss Beale, as well as to Miss Buss and Miss Clough, as quite typically law-abiding and obedient women.
Quietness, in its most literal sense, is most curiously characteristic of all the educational leaders. The very thought of Emily Davies, reticent and self-controlled, gives a sense of calm and stillness. For long years we see Frances Mary Buss curbing her magnificent energies to the “daily round, the common task.” Anne Clough works in silence for a lifetime, between the first little day school in Liverpool and the success of Newnham. Dorothea Beale, though she can rise to all poetic heights, is observant of all the small sweet courtesies of lowly service, and, if “learned” in all school-lore, is also notably “learned in all gracious household ways.” And the same must be said of Frances Martin, who, in her College for Working Women, has so extended the range of the new education that none now need be left out.
Nor are these qualities less conspicuous in the group of what may be termed the “amateurs” of the movement—true “lovers” of their kind, who, having all that heart could desire of this world’s good, have made it their business to share it with those less favoured: Lady Stanley of Alderley, Lady Augusta Stanley, Lady Frederick Cavendish, Mrs. Manning and her daughter Miss E. A. Manning, Mrs. Reed, Miss Bostock, Mrs. Wedgwood, Madame Bodichon, Miss Ewart, and Miss L. M. Hubbard, all more lavish of time and thought and wealth than of words. And then all the active workers: sweet Mrs. Grey, with the touch of old-world stateliness adding strength to her sweetness; Miss Shirreff and Miss Mary Gurney, of few words, but these straight to the point; Mrs. Burbury, true to her University traditions, and Mrs. Garrett-Anderson, with the professional reticence learned in her fight through the medical schools; Miss Davenport-Hill, known to the School Board as the woman who can hold her tongue, and her sister Florence, “wisest of wise women,” as her friends call her, also with a great gift of silence; Miss Laura Soames, too early taken from us; and the many more like-minded, whose works rather than their tongues still speak for them.
It is not, indeed, that any one of these lacks the power to speak, for on some occasion most have been known to speak even from the platform, and to speak well. But not to women like these could those famous words of Mrs. Browning’s ever be held appropriate—
“A woman cannot do the thing she ought,—
Which means whatever perfect thing she can,
In life, in art, in science,—but she fears
To let the perfect action take her part,
And rest there: she must prove what she can do
Before she does it, prate of woman’s rights,