Or again:—
‘N’est-il pas vrai que la fadeur de la vie est à la fois le grand malheur et le grand danger? Il y a une douzaine d’années, un orateur s’écriait à la tribune: “La France s’ennuie.” Et moi je dis: L’humanité s’ennuie, et son ennui ne date ni d’aujourd’hui ni d’hier, quoique peut-être il n’ait jamais été plus visible qu’en ce moment. Sans la poursuite d’un but idéal, toute vie devient inevitablement insipide, même jusqu’au dégout. Or, comptez parmi vos connaissances les personnes qui poursuivent un but élevé. Beaucoup vivent sans savoir pourquoi, uniquement, je pense, parce que chaque matin ramène le soleil. Que de femmes, si vous exceptez les mères qui se donnent à leur famille, que de femmes, hélas, dont la vie se passe entière dans de futiles occupations, ou dans des conversations plus futiles encore! Et l’on s’étonne que, rongées d’ennui, elles recherchent avec frénésie toutes les distractions imaginables! Elles accusent la monotonie de leur existence d’être la cause de ce vague malaise; la vraie cause est ailleurs, elle est dans la fadeur intolérable, non d’une vie dépourvue d’événements et d’aventures, mais d’une vie dont on n’entrevoit pas la raison ni le but. On se sent vivre sans qu’on y soit pour quelque chose, et cette vie inconsciente, inutile, absurde, inspire un mécontentement trop fondé.’[3]
Such things the modern girl reads, and every word is confirmed by her own experience. With the practical English mind, which she has inherited from her father, she applies it all to herself. She seeks for counsel, and she finds it. She is bidden to ‘look around her’—to do the duty that lies nearest—to teach in the schools, or visit the poor—to take up a pursuit—to lay down a course of study and stick to it. She looks around her, and sees no particular call to active exertion. The duties that lie in the way are swallowed up by an energetic mother or elder sister; very possibly she has no vocation for philanthropy—and the most devoted philanthropists are the most urgent in warning off people who lack the vocation—or she lives in a village where the children are better taught than she could teach them, and the poor are already too much visited by the clergyman’s family; she feels no sort of impulse to take up any particular pursuit, or to follow out a course of study; and so long as she is quiet and amiable, and does not get out of health, nobody wants her to do anything. Her relations and friends—her world—are quite satisfied that she should ‘hang about upon life, merely following her own’—or their own—‘caprices and fancies.’ The advice given, so easy to offer, so hard to follow, presupposes exactly what is wanting, a formed and disciplined character, able to stand alone, and to follow steadily a predetermined course, without fear of punishment, or hope of reward. Ought we to wonder if, in the great majority of cases, girls let themselves go drifting down the stream, despising themselves, but listlessly yielding to what seems to be their fate?
An appeal to natural guides is most often either summarily dismissed, or received with reproachful astonishment. It is considered a just cause for surprise and disappointment, that well brought up girls, surrounded with all the comforts of home, should have a wish or a thought extending beyond its precincts. And, perhaps, it is only natural that parents should be slow to encourage their daughters in aspirations after any duties and interests besides those of ministering to their comfort and pleasure. In taking for granted that this is the only object, other than that of marriage, for which women were created, they are but adopting the received sentiment of society. No doubt, too, they honestly believe that, in keeping their daughters to themselves till they marry, they are doing the best thing for them, as well as pleasing themselves. If the daughters take a different view, parents think it is because they are young and inexperienced, and incompetent to judge. The fact is, it is the parents who are inexperienced. Their youth was different in a hundred ways from the youth of this generation; and the experience of thirty years ago is far from being infallible in dealing with the difficulties and perplexities of the present. No doubt young people are ignorant, and want guidance. But they should be helped and advised, not silenced. Parents take upon themselves a heavy responsibility when they hastily crush the longing after a larger and more purposeful life.
That such an impulse is worthy of respect can scarcely be denied. The existence of capacities is in itself an indication that they are intended for some good purpose. Conscious power is not a burden, to be borne with patience, but a gift, for the due use of which the possessor rightly feels accountable. To have a soul which can be satisfied with vanities is not eminently virtuous and Christian, but the reverse. To be awake to responsibilities, sensitive in conscience, quickly responsive to all kindling influences, is a sign that education has, so far, done a good work. A flowing river is no doubt more troublesome to manage than a tranquil pool; but pools, if let alone too long, are apt to become noxious, as well as useless. The current may require to be wisely directed; but that there should be a current of being, wanting to set itself somewhere, is surely a cause for thankful rejoicing. It is an unfortunate misunderstanding of the true state of the case that makes parents sigh over what might well be their happiness and pride: one more exemplification of the sluggishness which hates nothing so bitterly as to be called upon to think—to consider a new idea—perhaps to go farther, and take a step out of the beaten track. It is much easier, no doubt, to say to a daughter who comes to you with her original notions—‘My dear child, put it out of your head directly; it cannot be thought of for a moment’—than it would be to hear her patiently, to consider how far her crude ideas are practicable, to help her, so far as may be, in carrying them out. And one ought not to wonder that the easiest course is the one most commonly chosen. How far it may, or may not, be the duty of daughters to sacrifice their own wishes to the temporary pleasure of those to whom they owe so much, is a separate question. It is at least well for parents to know that, far more than they are at all aware of, it is felt to be a sacrifice, and that they must accept it as such, if at all.[4]
The representation here given is, of course, not universally applicable. It is quite possible that in some senses, and to some persons, an apparently empty life may be easier, and even richer, than one of toil. There are people to whom the Happy Valley kind of life is by no means intolerable; and even earnest-minded and conscientious girls, urged by a strong sense of the heinousness of discontent, often manage to crush troublesome aspirations, and make themselves happy. There is something undignified in being miserable, without a just and intelligible cause to show for it; and many young women, capable of higher things, accommodate themselves with a considerable degree of cheerfulness to a narrow and unsatisfying round of existence. Nor is it intended to represent ladies as habitually doing nothing. On the contrary, they have many resources. Among them are various arts and handicrafts, gardening, letter-writing, and much reading. Of these, the last is perhaps the most popular and the most delusive. A girl who is ‘very fond of reading’ is considered to be happily suited with never-failing occupation, and no thought is taken as to what is to come of her reading. On this subject, the observations of Miss Aikin, herself an experienced reader, are worth considering. ‘Continual reading,’ she says, ‘if desultory, and without a definite object, favours indolence, unsettles opinions, and of course enfeebles the mental and moral energies.’ And Mr Robertson of Brighton, speaking in reference to girls, remarks that they ‘read too much, and think too little. I will answer for it that there are few girls of eighteen who have not read more books than I have.... That multifarious reading weakens the mind more than doing nothing; for it becomes a necessity at last, like smoking, and is an excuse for the mind to lie dormant, whilst thought is poured in, and runs through, a clear stream, over unproductive gravel, on which not even mosses grow. It is the idlest of all idlenesses, and leaves more of impotency than any other.’
The same might be said of all merely dilettante occupation. Its fault is simply that it is dilettante—literally a pastime. It may as well be done, if nothing else turns up, and that is all. And this drawback, belonging to nearly all the ordinary work of young women, they are by themselves unable to overcome. Of course, the case is partly in their own hands, and those who are by nature abnormally energetic, will make a career for themselves in spite of difficulties. Where the inward impulse is irrepressible, it becomes a lantern to the feet, and a lamp unto the path, making the way of duty plain and unmistakable. But for the few whose course is thus illumined, there will be the many hovering in uneasy doubt, their consciences and intellects just lively enough to make them restless and unhappy, not sufficiently clear in their minds as to right and wrong, either to be nerved for vigorous action, or to accept contentedly the conventional duty of quiescence. There must be something wrong in social regulations which make a demand for exceptional wisdom and strength on the part of any particular class; and that such a demand is made upon average young women is sufficiently clear. What society says to them seems to be something to this effect. Either you have force enough to win a place in the world, in the face of heavy discouragement, or you have not. If you have, the discipline of the struggle is good for you; if you have not, you are not worth troubling about. Is not this a hard thing to say to commonplace girls, not professing to be better or stronger than their neighbours? Why should their task be made, by social and domestic arrangements, peculiarly and needlessly difficult? And why should it be taken for granted that, if they fail, they must be extraordinarily silly or self-indulgent? More than any other class, at the same age, they are exempted from direction and control—liberally gifted with the kind of freedom enjoyed by the denizens of a village pound. Within their prescribed sphere, they may wander at will, and if they ‘there small scope for action see,’ it is explained to them that they must not ‘for this give room to discontent;’ nor let their time ‘be spent in idly dreaming’ how they might be
‘More free
From outward hindrance or impediment.
For presently this hindrance thou shalt find
That without which all goodness were a task
So slight, that virtue never could grow strong.’
In reply to such admonitions they are tempted to inquire what task, other than that of dreaming, is set before them—what virtue, always excepting that one virtue of passive submission, has any chance of growing strong under such conditions. The ‘slow,’ who sink into dull inertia, and the ‘fast,’ who get rid of their superfluous energy in silly extravagances, have alike the excuse, that at the moment when they need the support of a routine explained and justified by a reasonable purpose, discipline and stimulus are at once withdrawn, leaving in their place no external support beyond the trivial demands and restraints of conventional society.
It may seem that an exaggerated importance is here attached to the interval between school and marriage; and if the considerations brought forward had reference to this period only, the charge would be just. But rightly to estimate the value of these years, we must bear in mind that they are the spring-time of life—the season of blossom, on which the fruit of the future depends. It is then that an impress is given to character which lasts through life. Opportunities then thrown away or misused can scarcely be recovered in later years. And it has seemed necessary to dwell upon the existing tenour of young women’s lives, because, in dealing with the question of extending the duration of female education, we must be largely influenced by our conception of the alternative involved in leaving things as they are. It has been said that the end of education is ‘to form a nation of living, orderly men.’ If it has been shown that the course now pursued tends to make a large part of the nation inanimate and disorderly, a case would seem to be established for urging efforts at improvement.