These books ranged onward from 1790, and the force of the influence was not spent for twenty years. Among them, I recall, at this moment, Dr. Alexander's "History of Women" in two quarto volumes; Matilda Betham's "Biographical Dictionary," an honest, if not a valuable, attempt to supply a want still felt in English literature; and Cotton's translation of the mathematical works of Maria Agnesi. These were born of a common mother. I read the "Vindication," therefore, with persistent care; looking with fruitless question for the second and third volumes that were promised. Could this be the book which had been so abused for half a century? The American edition had been published before garbling became the fashion; but I took pains to collate it carefully with the English. It was all in vain. I found only a simple, determined, eloquent plea for a proper education for women, urged on social, moral, and religious grounds; an earnest protest against Rousseau and Dr. Gregory; and a demand that men should be subject to the same moral laws as women. Very revolutionary this! Reprint it, under modern sponsorship, and you would find it perhaps too heavy to read. It would only repeat what you all know, and you would miss the fanatical spice of our later speech. Yet this book was so much needed when it appeared, that it acted on the under-current of English thought and life like a subsoil plough, and brought all manner of abominations to the surface. The preface alone contains any allusion to woman's political rights. If is dedicated to Talleyrand, who, in publishing a pamphlet on national education, had admitted the inconsistency of debarring women from their exercise. From this preface, the world took fright, and we may judge in what manner she intended to follow up her plea for education. Let me quote a few passages. "I earnestly wish," she says, "to point out in what true dignity and human happiness consist. I wish to persuade women to acquire strength both of mind and body, and to convince them, that the soft phrases, 'susceptibility of heart,' 'delicacy of sentiment,' and 'refinement of taste,' are almost synonymous with epithets of weakness, and that those beings who are the objects of pity, and that kind of love which has been termed its sister, will soon become objects of contempt."—"An air of fashion is but a badge of slavery."—"It follows," she says farther on, "that women should either be shut up, like Eastern princesses, or educated in such a manner as to think and act for themselves."—"Suppose a woman trained to obedience, married to a sensible man, who directs her judgment, without permitting her to feel the servility of her position. She cannot ensure the life of her protector. He may die, and leave her at the head of a large family."—"It is not empire, but equality, woman should contend for. When women are sufficiently enlightened to discover their real interests, they will be very ready to resign all those prerogatives of love which are not mutual for the calm satisfactions of friendship and the tender confidence of habitual esteem. Before marriage, they will not assume any insolent airs, nor afterwards abjectly submit; but, endeavoring to act like reasonable creatures in both relations, they will not be tumbled from a throne to a stool."
This is the character of the whole book. It contains nothing more subversive of morality than these words. You cannot do better than read it, and receive, as I did, a lasting lesson on the folly of prejudice. As a work of art, it is irregular in method, and impulsive in execution; facts not to be wondered at, since it was written and printed in the brief space of six weeks. Dr. Channing once wrote of her: "I have lately read Mary Wollstonecraft's posthumous works. Her letters towards the close of the first volume are the best I ever read. They are superior to Sterne's. I consider her the greatest woman of the age. Her 'Rights of Woman' is a masculine performance, and ought to be studied by her sex; the sentiments are noble and generous."
What, then, was the character of the woman? Was it as strong and generous as the sentiments she advocated? Her life broke down some social barriers, and, though noble and heroic when viewed from within, looks hampered and unsatisfactory from the common stand-point. Godwin has erected an exquisite monument to her memory, in a sketch written soon after her decease. Mary Wollstonecraft was born near London in the year 1759. She came into an unhappy and uncongenial home. Her father was a passionate tyrant; her mother, compelled to submit to his caprice, became like every other slave, a tyrant where she had the power, and ruled her children with a rod of iron. By defending her mother from her husband's violence, Mary early extorted some degree of affection from the one, and respect from the other. Her father had some property, which he seems to have squandered by frequent changes of abode; and a day school at Beverley, in Yorkshire, gave her her principal advantages of education. An eccentric clergyman at Hoxton, named Clare, added some farther instruction. Under his roof, she formed an intimacy with Frances Blood, destined to influence her whole life. This girl was remarkably accomplished, and, at the age of eighteen, supported her father and mother and their family of younger children. She was delicately neat and proper in all she did; and her influence was of the greatest benefit to Mary, who had often desired to assist her family, but was deterred by the helpless condition of her mother. She now went as companion to a family at Bath, but soon relinquished the position, on account of her mother's serious illness. Mrs. Wollstonecraft was exacting and troublesome. Mary nursed her with devoted care, but, after her death, bade a final farewell to her father's roof. His affairs had become wretchedly involved; and, with Fanny Blood and her two sisters, she proceeded to open a day school. At first, she had looked upon Fanny as her superior, but her own force of character soon found its rightful position. The health of her friend broke down under her unnatural burden, and Mary's devotion to her for years was beautiful to see. Her marriage and removal to Lisbon, in a vain search for health, soon put this devotion to the test.
At this point, Mary Wollstonecraft's reputation was unsullied. She was an admirable manager, an efficient and successful teacher; yet, when Fannie became seriously ill, she did not hesitate to risk her only means of support, the prosperity of her school, to go to her. Her friend, Dr. Price, the Unitarian minister, and Mrs. Burgh, were annoyed at what they considered a quixotic devotion; but they supplied her with money, and she went. A few days closed in death an intimacy of more than ten years, which had been, until this time, Mary's tenderest interest in life. On her way home, her moral energy saved the lives of a French crew in a sailing vessel which she encountered, just about to founder. Her school had suffered by her absence; and the pressing necessities of Fanny's family, in which she still took an interest, induced her to have recourse to literature. The first ten pounds received from her "Thoughts on the Education of Daughters" went to their relief. Nothing can be sadder than to see a young girl placed as Mary Wollstonecraft now was,—compelled to fulfil the duties of a father and mother to younger brothers and sisters. The position is unnatural. Gratitude might be expected, but envy is more often felt. The personal advantages sought for their sakes, and not to be transferred except as a pecuniary profit, she is supposed to seek for her own. Affection partly yields, and enthusiasm does not replace it; while she is urged by necessities which make it difficult to bear the errors and intractabilities of those she is providing for. Still loving, and desiring to provide for her sisters, Mary thought it better to live apart from them, and accepted a temporary position as governess in Lord Kingsborough's family. When they left England, she went to Bristol, and published a novel, which, founded on her ten years of friendly devotion, took the highest rank as a work of sentiment. The next three years were spent in her own house, in London, in the active service of the publisher, Johnson. She translated from French, German, and Italian, wrote several books for children, and took a large share in the conduct of the "Analytical Review."
Her translation of Salzman's "Elements of Morality" led to an interesting correspondence with its author, who repaid the service, subsequently, by translating into German her "Rights of Woman." These occupations, if they did little towards the discipline of her powers, served to rouse her from the dejection into which the death of her friend had plunged her. Her earnings were now devoted to her own family. One sister she kept at Paris for two years to qualify her as a governess; another she placed as parlor-boarder at a London school. Her brother James she sent to Woolwich; afterward procuring for him a position in the navy, where he soon rose to be a lieutenant. Her favorite, Charles, she placed with a farmer for instruction; and then fitted him out for America, where he grew wealthy on the basis she provided. This brother must have left a large family in the State of New York. Her brothers and sisters thus established, she attempted to rescue a support for her father from his broken and confused fortunes. This proving impossible, he was supported by her own labor, until his death. The very great demands made upon her by such natural obligations did not prevent her from assuming others. She adopted for her own the child of a dead friend, the niece of John Hunter. Her brilliancy, her personal beauty, her unselfish devotion, could not fail to win for her many loving friends; and among them the French Revolution found her. The work which first gave her her proper literary rank was her answer to Burke's Reflections upon that movement. She wrote rapidly: her pamphlet was the first of the many that appeared, and obtained extraordinary success. The public applause warmed her, and her next production was her celebrated "Vindication of the Rights of Woman." The startling energy with which she exploded the system of gallantry, a miserable relic of the Stuart courts, roused the popular indignation. It was hard to reconcile the vigor of her rebuke to the tender sentiment which trembled through the book, and also to the impression produced by Mary herself, lovely in person, and, in the most engaging sense, feminine in her manners. Her intimacy with the historical painter, Fuseli, followed. He was a man of powerful genius and strong prejudices. His influence upon Mary, if it was sometimes refreshing, could not always have been beneficial. The reader of Haydon's Autobiography will remember this man. A wider knowledge of the world would have protected her from his influence: as it was, she pursued the intimacy with unsuspecting delight; for Fuseli was a contented husband, and his wife was her friend. She was now in her thirty-second year; she had arrived at a period when domestic happiness of some sort becomes essential to the strongest woman. The fullest-fruited laurel then withers before her eyes, if it has not taken root at her own hearth. At the close of the year 1792, Mary took refuge in Paris from the chagrin and restlessness which began to oppress her. Her years of toil had left her sad and lonely: she needed to rest for a little while in human affection. She could not even write to her own satisfaction; for her morbid fatigue led her to reproduce Fuseli's cynicism, and she dared not trust herself. She entered the best circles of Parisian society, and became intimate with the leaders of the Revolution. In four months after her arrival occurred the most untoward event of her life,—her marriage to a worthless American named Gilbert Imlay; a name rescued from oblivion only by his temporary attachment to her. I say her marriage, for Imlay offered himself in marriage, and was accepted as a husband; but, taking advantage of a custom not unusual at Paris in those disorderly times, Mary refused to consummate the legal forms. Mr. Imlay had no property. Mary had a large family to support; and she neither wished to become answerable for his debts, nor to make him responsible for hers. She took the name of Imlay; and, expecting to follow her brother to America, she obtained from our ambassador at Paris a certificate of American citizenship, to serve as a temporary protection. In order that you may comprehend the precise significance which this step had in that place and at that time, let me remind you, that Helen Maria Williams, her personal friend, and the ward of Dr. Rees of cyclopedic memory, was married in the same way to a Mr. Edwards, then in Paris. She was a well-known writer of that period; and we are still indebted to her for some of the best hymns sung in our churches,—among them, that well-known hymn, beginning, "While thee I seek, protecting Power." But her husband was worthy of the trust she had reposed in him, and she never turned a ready pen against the follies of society: so her character has never stood in the public stocks.
It will be impossible to consider Mary's attachment to Imlay in any degree rational, if we look only at her character, and keep out of sight her peculiar personal history.
The dawdling inefficiency and brutal temper of her father had disgusted her alike with "men of spirit" and "men of straw." In her husband, she saw, as she thought, a certain democratic manliness; and his daring speculations seemed to be inspired by courage and genius. The affections which had been roused by her admiring intercourse with Fuseli kindled gladly on this new shrine, where no social duty, nor stern sense of personal honor, contended against her warming fancy. For the first time in her life, she found herself happy; and happiness gave her back the beauty of early youth. She was playful, gentle, sympathetic. Her eyes had new brightness, her cheeks new color, and the bewitching tenderness of her smile fascinated the very women who approached her. She had been married eighteen months, her love braving all the trials that must have come, when Imlay left her for London. She had expected his quick return; but delay followed delay, and Mary passed a year with a new-born child, learning, by slow and painful degrees, that she had trusted this man beyond his worth. At last, he sent for her to London, where his misconduct affected her mind to such an extent, that she twice attempted her own life, and was rescued the second time with difficulty. As soon as she recovered from the fever which had induced delirium, her native strength told her what she ought to do. Imlay had business in Norway, which required a confidential and judicious agent. She determined to take this upon herself; and hoped, by absence and success, to regain the affection she had lost. The man was, in no sense, worthy of her. On her return, she tried, for the sake of their child, to remain in the same house with him. It was not possible; and, very soon, a final separation took place. It would have taken place long before, but that Imlay was a man who could not wholly escape from a fascination he had once felt. After he became involved in low connections, he could never re-enter her presence, without resuming, for the time, the sympathetic delicacy befitting her lover. During all this time, Mary had occupied herself with literary work. She never spoke of Imlay, and would allow no one to blame him in her presence. Conscious of her own upright intentions, it must have been no small mortification to find her insight and generosity baffled. She felt that she was herself to blame for having placed an impulsive man in a position to which he was wholly unequal. She was everywhere received and treated as a married woman, and lost none of the respect and affection she had well deserved. In April, 1797, she was married to Godwin, the author of "St. Leon;" and this marriage deprived her of two new friends, whom she held very dear. Godwin was so artless, that he imagined his wife's social position would be improved by an honorable marriage; but it obliged Mrs. Inchbald and Mrs. Siddons to admit that the nature of her marriage to Imlay allowed her to take her divorce into her own hands.
Wonderful inconsistency of society, which, having interpreted truly her upright nature through years of desertion, now condemned her,—whether for her first wrong step, for assuming her own divorce, or for loving a man of undoubted probity, who could tell? A short year of undisturbed happiness followed, when the birth of their only child—the late Mrs. Shelley—suddenly put an end to her life.