Thus some thirty or forty ladies of high character and culture would be provided with the independence and advantages now exclusively bestowed on men, while at the same time the institution would practically and to a considerable extent be an orphan asylum offering unusual advantages.
In regard to the practicability of finding women properly qualified to carry on such a university with success, there is no difficulty. Few know so well as I do how many women of benevolence and
high culture are living with half their noblest energies unemployed for want of the opportunities and facilities provided for men. There is nothing needed but endowments to secure the services of a large number of ladies of the highest culture and moral worth, well qualified to establish not only one but many such institutions.
In my attempts to organize female institutions on the college plan of independent principals of endowed departments, responsible not to an individual but to a faculty and corporation, I have been met with objections that apply as much to colleges for men. The jealousies and jars incident to all complex institutions are the result of the frailties of humanity common to both sexes. I have, in a large number of instances, organized institutions on the college plan, which for years were conducted with perfect harmony, some of them are still prospering, and others were ended only for want of endowments to retain the highest class of teachers.
AN ADDRESS TO LADIES OF HARTFORD, CONN.,
INVITED FROM ALL RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS;
DELIVERED AT THE
Calisthenic Hall of the Hartford Female Seminary,
MAY, 1871.
Ladies and Kind Friends:
At a former meeting I stated that, as former principal of this Seminary, I so exhausted my nervous system that I have never been able to assume responsibilities involving obligations which, by my failure, would cause disappointment to others. My method, therefore, has been to originate plans, and then induce others, more capable than myself, to execute them, and in such a way that I could help without taking any responsibility.
Thus I originated the plan for transferring teachers to the West, executed by Gov. Slade. And thus also I organized the American Women's