Exceptional women. Joan of Arc
There are women whose career has been altogether exceptional; and these, like the rest, meet with their due tribute of praise in the Positive system. The chief motive, doubtless, for public and private veneration is the mission of sympathy, which is Woman’s peculiar vocation. But there have been remarkable instances of women whose life has been one of speculation, or even, what is in most cases still more foreign to their nature, of political activity. They have rendered real service to Humanity, and they should receive the honour that is due to them. Theology, from its absolute character, could not make such concessions; they would have weakened the efficiency of its most important social rules. Consequently, Catholicism was compelled, though at first with sincere regret, to leave some of the noblest women without commemoration. A signal instance is the Maid of Orleans, whose heroism saved France in the fifteenth century. Our great king Louis XI applied very properly to the Pope for her canonization, and no objection was made to his request. Yet, practically, it was never carried into effect. It was gradually forgotten; and the clergy soon came to feel a sort of dislike to her memory, which reminded them of nothing but their own social weakness. It is easy to account for this result; nor is any one really to blame for it. It was feared, not without reason, that to consider Joan of Arc as a saint might have the effect of spreading false and dangerous ideas of feminine duty. The difficulty was insuperable for any absolute system, in which to sanction the exception is to compromise the rule. But in a relative system the case is different. It is even more inconsistent with Positive principles than it is with Catholic, for women to lead a military life, a life which of all others is the least compatible with their proper functions. And yet Positivists will be the first to do justice to this extraordinary heroine, whom theologians have been afraid to recognize, and whom metaphysicians, even in France, have had the hardihood to insult. The anniversary of her glorious martyrdom will be a solemn festival, not only for France, but for Western Europe. For her work was not merely of national importance: the enslavement of France would have involved the loss of all the influence which France has exercised as the centre of the advanced nations of Europe. Moreover, as none of them are altogether clear from the disgrace of detracting, as Voltaire has done, from her character, all should aid in the reparation of it which Positivism proposes to institute. So far from her apotheosis having an injurious effect on female character, it will afford an opportunity of pointing out the anomalous nature of her career, and the rarity of the conditions which alone could justify it. It is a fresh proof of the advantages accruing to Morality from the relative character of Positivism, which enables it to appreciate exceptional cases without weakening the rules.
The subject of the worship of Woman by Man raises a question of much delicacy; how to satisfy the analogous feelings of devotion in the other sex. We have seen its necessity for men as an intermediate step towards the worship of Humanity; and women, stronger though their sympathies are, stand, it may be, in need of similar preparation. Yet certainly the direction taken should be somewhat different. What is wanted is that each sex should strengthen the moral qualities in which it is naturally deficient. Energy is a characteristic feature of Humanity as well as Sympathy; as is well shown by the double meaning of the word Heart. In Man Sympathy is the weaker element, and it requires constant exercise. This he gains by expression of his feelings of reverence for Woman. In Woman, on the other hand, the defective quality is Energy; so that, should any special preparation for the worship of Humanity be needed, it should be such as to strengthen courage rather than sympathy. But my sex renders me incompetent to enter farther into the secret wants of Woman’s heart. Theory indicates a blank hitherto unnoticed, but does not enable me to fill it. It is a problem for women themselves to solve; and I had reserved it for my noble colleague, for whose premature death I would fain hope that my own grief may one day be shared by all.
Throughout this chapter I have been keenly sensible of the philosophic loss resulting from our objective separation. True, I have been able to show that Positivism is a matter of the deepest concern to women, since it incorporates them in the progressive movement of modern times. I have proved that the part allotted to them in this movement is one which satisfies their highest aspirations for the Family or for Society. And yet I can hardly hope for much support from them until some woman shall come forward to interpret what I have said into language more adapted to their nature and habits of thought. Till then it will always be taken for granted that they are incapable even of understanding the new philosophy, notwithstanding all the natural affinities for it which I have shown that they possess.
All these difficulties had been entirely removed by the noble and loving friend to whom I dedicate the treatise to which this work is introductory. The dedication is unusual in form, and some may think it overstrained. But my own fear is rather, now that five years have past, that my words were too weak for the deep gratitude which I now feel for her elevating influence. Without it the moral aspects of Positivism would have lain very long latent.
Clotilde de Vaux was gifted equally in mind and heart: and she had already begun to feel the power of the new philosophy to raise feminine influence from the decline into which it had fallen, under the revolutionary influences of modern times. Misunderstood everywhere, even by her own family, her nature was far too noble for bitterness. Her sorrows were as exceptional as they were undeserved; but her purity was even more rare than her sorrow; and it preserved her unscathed from all sophistical attacks on marriage, even before the true theory of marriage had come before her. In the only writing which she published[10], there is a beautiful remark, which to those who know the history of her life is deeply affecting: ‘Great natures should always be above bringing their sorrows upon others’. In this charming story, written before she knew anything of Positivism, she expressed herself most characteristically on the subject of Woman’s vocation: ‘Surely the true sphere of Woman is to provide Man with the comforts and delights of home, receiving in exchange from him the means of subsistence earned by his labours. I would rather see the mother of a poor family washing her children’s linen, than see her earning a livelihood by her talents away from home. Of course I do not speak of women of extraordinary powers whose genius leads them out of the sphere of domestic duty. Such natures should have free scope given to them: for great minds are kindled by the exhibition of their powers’. These words coming from a young lady distinguished no less for beauty than for worth, showed her antipathy to the subversive ideas so prevalent in the present day. But in a large work which she did not live to finish, she had intended to refute the attacks upon marriage, contained in the works of George Sand, to whom she was intellectually no less than morally superior. Her nature was of rare endowment, moved by noble impulse, and yet allowing its due influence to reason. When she was beginning to study Positivism she wrote to me: ‘No one knows better than myself how weak our nature is unless it has some lofty aim beyond the reach of passion’. A short time afterwards, writing with all the graceful freedom of friendship, she let fall a phrase of deep meaning, almost unawares: ‘Our race is one which must have duties, in order to form its feelings’.
With such a nature my Saint Clotilde was, as may be supposed, fully conscious of the moral value of Positivism, though she had only one year to give to its study. A few months before her death, she wrote to me: ‘If I were a man, I should be your enthusiastic disciple; as a woman, I can but offer you my cordial admiration’. In the same letter she explains the part which she proposed to take in diffusing the principles of the new philosophy: ‘It is always well for a woman to follow modestly behind the army of renovators, even at the risk of losing a little of her own originality’. She describes our intellectual anarchy in this charming simile: ‘We are all standing as yet with one foot in the air over the threshold of truth’.
It is for women to introduce Positivism into the Southern nations
With such a colleague, combining as she did qualities hitherto shared amongst the noblest types of womanhood, it would have been easy to induce her sex to co-operate in the regeneration of society. For she gave a perfect example of that normal reaction of Feeling upon Reason which has been here set forward as the highest aim of Woman’s efforts. When she had finished the important work on which she was engaged, I had marked out for her a definite yet spacious field of co-operation in the Positivist cause: a field which her intellect and character were fully competent to occupy. I mention it here, to illustrate the mode in which women may help to spread Positivism through the West; giving thus the first example of the social influence which they will afterwards exert permanently. What I say has special reference to Italy and to Spain. In other countries it only applies to individuals who, though living in an atmosphere of free thought, have not themselves ventured to think freely. Success in this latter case is so frequent, as to make me confident that the agencies of which I am about to speak may be applied collectively with the same favourable result.
The intellectual freedom of the West began in England and Germany; and it had all the dangers of original efforts for which at that time no systematic basis could be found. With the legal establishment of Protestantism, the metaphysical movement stopped. Protestantism, by consolidating it, seriously impeded subsequent progress, and is still, in the countries where it prevails, the chief obstacle to all efficient renovation. Happily France, the normal centre of Western Europe, was spared this so-called Reformation. She made up for the delay, by passing at one stride, under the impulse given by Voltaire, to a state of entire freedom of thought; and thus resumed her natural place as leader of the common movement of social regeneration. But the French while escaping the inconsistencies and oscillations of Protestantism, have been exposed to all the dangers resulting from unqualified acceptance of revolutionary metaphysics. Principles of systematic negation have now held their ground with us too long. Useful as they once were in preparing the way for social reconstruction, they are now a hindrance to it. It may be hoped that when the movement of free thought extends, as it assuredly will, to the two Southern nations, where Catholicism has been more successful in resisting Protestantism and Deism, it will be attended with less injurious consequences. If France was spared the Calvinistic stage, there seems no reason why Italy and even Spain should not be spared Voltairianism. As a compensation for this apparent stagnation, they might pass at once from Catholicism to Positivism, without halting for any length of time at the negative stage. These countries could not have originated the new philosophy, owing to their insufficient preparation; but as soon as it has taken root in France, they will probably accept it with extreme rapidity. Direct attacks upon Catholicism will not be necessary. The new religion will simply put itself into competition with the old by performing in a better way the same functions that Catholicism fulfils now, or has fulfilled in past times.