Mary Wollstonecraft

by Elizabeth Robins Pennell

The next chapter, on Paternal Affection, leads to the third part of the treatise. It is not enough for a reformer to pull down. He must build up as well, or at least lay the foundation stone of a new structure. The missionary does not only tell the heathen that his religion is false, but he instructs him in the new one which is to take its place. The scientist, besides maintaining that old theories are exploded, explains to the student new facts which have superseded them. Mary, after demonstrating the viciousness of existing educational systems, suggests wherein they may be improved, so that women, their understandings trained and developed, may have the chance to show what they really are.

Family duties necessarily precede those of society. As the “formation of the mind must be begun very early, and the temper, in particular, requires the most judicious attention,” a child’s training should be undertaken, not from the time it is sent to school, but almost from the moment of its birth. Therefore a few words as to the relations between parents and children are an indispensable introduction to the larger subject of education, properly so called, which prepares the young for social life.

Father and mother are rightful protectors of their child, and should accept the charge of it, instead of hiring a substitute for this purpose. It is not even enough for them to be regulated in this matter by the dictates of natural affection. They must be guided by reason. For there are the two equally dangerous extremes of tyrannical exercise of power and of weak indulgence to be avoided. Unless their understanding be strengthened and enlightened, they will not know what duties to exact from their children. In their own disregard of reason as a guide to conduct, they “demand blind obedience,” and, to render their demand binding, a “mysterious sanctity is spread around the most arbitrary principle.” Parents have a right to expect their children throughout their lives to pay them due respect, give heed to their advice, and take care of them should illness or old age make it impossible for them to do this for themselves; but they should never desire to subjugate their sons and daughters to their own will, after they have arrived at years of discretion and can answer for their actions. To obey a parent, “only on account of his being a parent, shackles the mind, and prepares it for a slavish submission to any power but reason.” These remarks are particularly applicable to girls, who “from various causes are more kept down by their parents, in every sense of the word, than boys,” though in the case of the latter there is still room for improvement. That filial duty should thus be reduced to slavery is inexcusable, since children can very soon be made to understand why they are requested to do certain things habitually. This, of course, necessitates trouble; but it is the only way to qualify them for contact with the world, and the active life which must come with their maturity.

Once this rational foundation has been laid for the formation of a child’s character, more immediate attention can be given to the development of its mental faculties and social tendencies.

The first step in solving the great problem of education—and here both sexes are referred to—is to decide whether it should be public or private. The objections to private education are serious. It is not good for children to be too much in the society of men and women; for they then “acquire that kind of premature manhood which stops the growth of every vigorous power of mind or body.” By growing accustomed to have their questions answered by older people instead of being obliged to seek the answers for themselves, as they are forced to do when thrown with other children, they do not learn how to think for themselves. The very groundwork of self-reliance is thus destroyed. “Besides, in youth the seeds of every affection should be sown, and the respectful regard which is felt for a parent is very different from the social affections that are to constitute the happiness of life as it advances.” “Frank ingenuousness” can only be attained by young people being frequently in society where they dare to speak what they think. To know how to live with their equals when they are grown up, children must learn to associate with them when they are young.

The evils which result from the boarding-school system are almost as great as those of private education. The tyranny established among the boys is demoralizing, while the acquiescence to the forms of religion demanded of them, encourages hypocrisy. Children who live away from home are unfitted for domestic life. “Public education of every denomination should be directed to form citizens, but if you wish to make good citizens, you must first exercise the affections of a son and a brother.” Home-training on the one hand, and boarding-schools on the other, being equally vicious, the only way out of the difficulty is to combine the two systems, retaining what is best in each, and doing away with what is evil. This combination could be obtained by the establishment of national day-schools.

They must be supported by government, because the school-master who is dependent upon the parents of children committed to his charge, necessarily caters to them. In schools for the upper classes, where the number of pupils is small and select, he spends his energies in giving them a show of knowledge wherewith they may startle friends and relations into admiration of his superior system. In common schools, where the charges are small, he is forced, in order to support himself, to multiply the number of pupils until it is impossible for him to do any one of them justice. But if education were a national affair, school-masters would be responsible to a board of directors, whose interest would be given to the boys collectively and not individually, while the number of pupils to be received would be strictly regulated.

To perfect national schools the sexes must be educated together. By this means only can they be prepared for their after relations to each other, women thus becoming enlightened citizens and rational companions for men. The experiment of co-education is at all events worth making. Even should it fail, women would not be injured thereby, “for it is not in the power of man to render them more insignificant than they are at present.”

Mary is very practical in this branch of her subject, and suggests an admirable educational scheme. In her levelling of rank among the young, she shows the influence of Plato; in her hint as to the possibility of uniting play and study in elementary education, she anticipates Froebel. Her ideas can be best appreciated by giving them in her own words:—

“To render this [that is, co-education] practicable, day-schools for particular ages should be established by government, in which boys and girls might be educated together. The school for the younger children, from five to nine years of age, ought to be absolutely free and open to all classes. A sufficient number of masters should also be chosen by a select committee, in each parish, to whom any complaint of negligence, etc., might be made, if signed by six of the children’s parents.