"Who," says Count Zinzendorf in Germany,—"who but my wife could have been alternately servant and mistress without affectation and without pride? Who could have maintained like her, in a democratic community, all outward and inward distinctions? Who, without a murmur, would have met such peril? Who could have raised such sums of money, and acquitted them on her own credit?"
To such women I think men will always offer generous help; and, even if they did not, there are props of God's own disposing. Let woman once reject the absurd notion that she was created for happiness, let her constitute herself instead a creator of it, let her accept with joy the fact that this is a working-day world; then she will no longer strive to escape from labor, discipline, or sorrow, but will gladly hail each in its turn as part of God's appointed teaching, a shadow crossing the sunshine to show that it is bright. Perhaps such a life is not easy, perhaps many feet must falter on such a path; but, indicating what I earnestly believe to be the will and way of God for us all, I earnestly entreat you to enter and walk therein. Some words written by John Ruskin upon Art seem to me to have such force in this connection as to make it justifiable to quote them.
Speaking of a painter who could only paint the fair and graceful in landscape, he says:—
"But such work had, nevertheless, its stern limitations, and marks of everlasting inferiority. Always soothing and pathetic, it could never be sublime, never freely nor entrancingly beautiful; for the man's narrow spirit could not cast itself freely into any scene. The calm cheerfulness which shrank from the shadow of the cypress and the distortion of the olive, could not enter into the brightness of the sky they pierced, nor the softness of the bloom they bore. For every sorrow that his heart turned from, he lost a consolation. For every fear which he dared not confront, he parted with a portion of his manliness. The unsceptred sweep of the storm-clouds, the fair freedom of glancing shower and flickering sunbeam, sunk into sweet rectitudes and decent formalisms; and, before eyes that refused to be dazzled or darkened, the hours of sunset wreathed their rays unheeded, and the mists of the Apennines spread their blue veils in vain."
Imagine these words written metaphorically of your own inner lives, and accept the lesson they convey. Be earnest to inherit the whole of human life. Insist on turning the golden shield, till you have, not merely the iron lining full in view, but whatsoever Medusa's head the Divine hand has traced thereon.
See how many women have excelled in literature and art, in philosophy and science, within the present century. Their literary contributions owe their popularity to intrinsic excellence: they have sought and found the light of day, without the pompous recommendations of institutions, or the forced encouragement of a clique. There is no limit to womanly attainment, other than the force of womanly desire. Bihéron, destined to become an anatomist, becomes one, whether the college of dissectors smile or frown. Wittembach, versed alike in the mysteries of ancient tongues and modern physics, becomes the counsellor of the wisest men of her time, without neglecting her pantry or her needle. There is no excuse for neglecting any home duty for the most desirable foreign pursuit. Let buttons and shirt-bosoms have their day, the lexicon or grammar its own also. Let the dinner-table be carefully spread; the food, not only well cooked, but gracefully laid,—before we seek the more precious nutriment of culture: and this, not so much because any one has a right to say it shall be so, as out of our own tender regard to the needs of others, and a desire, through every possible self-sacrifice, to make the common road easier, and turn recreant public opinion to its proper vent. Let a neatness as exquisite, as womanly and as polished as that of Charlotte Bronté, pervade not only our homes, but consecrate our own personal appearance; then may we safely wear the livery of schools. It may be double-dyed in indigo; yet, with this accessory, no man will assert that it is unbecoming, no woman have need to comfort her own ignorance by an unsisterly sneer.
If God intends woman to walk side by side with man wherever he sees fit to go, the movement now beginning must materially develop civilization. Finer elements will be poured into the molten metal of society; and, when the next cast is taken, we shall see sharper edges, bolder reliefs, and a finer lining, than we have been wont. Nor shall we miss the gentler graces. The classical world bitterly mourned the young and gifted lecturer, Olympia Morata; but not with the broken-hearted agony of the husband whose strength and life she had always been. Clotilda Tambroni was crowned, not only with the laurels of a Greek professorship, but with modesty and every virtue.
It was the tender appreciation of the WOMEN of Bologna that erected a stately monument to Laura Veratti.
In England, a woman writes admirable tales to endow a bishopric in a distant land. In our country, it was a pleasant omen, that the woman who first made literature a profession was urged to it, neither by scholarly taste nor an eccentric ambition, but to fulfil a mother's duty to four orphan children. Her literary career is not yet closed; and, though not lofty in its range, has been steadily pursued, and deserves the regard which it has won.
The names of Sedgwick, Sigourney, Kirkland, and Child suggest womanly excellences first of all. Let us pay the debt we owe these women, by following hopefully in the paths they have opened, till we create a public opinion without reproach.