A more liberal view was taken by Richard Mulcaster, the master of the school founded by the Merchant Taylors’ Company in 1561, in the parish of St. Lawrence Poultney. He says—
“I set not young maidens to public Grammar Scholes, a thing not used in my countrie, I send them not to the universities, having no president thereof in my countrie, I allow them learning with distinction in degrees, with difference of their calling, with respect to their endes wherefore they learne, wherin my countrie confirmeth my opinion. We see young maidens be taught to read and write, and can do both with praise; we have them sing and playe: and both passing well, we know that they learne the best, and finest of our learned languages, to the admiration of all men. For the daiely spoken tongues and of best reputation in our time who so shall denie that they may not compare even with our kinde in the best degree.... Nay, do we not see in our country some of that sex so excellently well trained and so rarely qualified either for the tongues themselves or for the matter in the tongues: as they may be opposed by way of comparison if not preferred as beyond comparison even to the best Romaine or Greekish paragones be they never so much praised: to the Germaine or French gentlewymen by late writers so wel liked: to the Italian ladies who dare write themselves and deserve fame for so doing? whose excellencie is so geason as they be rather wonders to gaze at then presidentes to follow. And is that to be called in question which we both dayly see in many and wonder at in some? I dare be bould, therefore, to admit yong maidens to learne, seeing my countrie gives me leave and her custome standes for me. Their natural towardnesse should make us see them well brought up.... Some Timon will say, what should wymend with learning? Such a churlish carper will never picke out the best, but be alway ready to blame the worst. If all men used all pointes of learning well, we had some reason to alledge against wymen, but seeing misuse is commonly both the kinds, why blame we their infirmitie whence we free not ourselves.... And is not, think you, a young gentlewoman thoroughly furnished which can reade plainly and distinctly, write faire and swiftly, sing cleare and sweetly, play wel and finely, understand and speake the learned languages, and the tongues also which the time most embraseth with some logicall helpe to chop and some rhetoricke to brave.... Or is it likely that her children shalbe eare a whit the worse brought up if she be a Lœlia, an Hortensia or a Cornelia, which were so endued and noted for so doing.... The places wherein they learne be either publike if they go forth to the elementaire schole or private if they be taught at home. The teacher either of their owne sex or of ours.... In teachers their owne sex were fittest in some respectes, but ours frame them best and with good regard to some circumstances will bring them up excellently well.”
CHAPTER III.
A LADY’S EDUCATION IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.
Retrogression in the seventeenth century—Tone of women’s education—Mrs. Hutchinson—Lady Ann Halkett—Mrs. Alice Thornton—Mrs. Makins—The Duchess of Newcastle—General estimation of learning—Changes in social life—Some patronesses of learning.
After the sixteenth century the lamp of learning flickered a good deal. The air was very unsteady; winds came blowing from all quarters. There was the adverse gale of the Civil War, which was a great peril to progress. And what followed was almost equally disastrous. Neither the austerity of the Puritans nor the licence of the Royalists was favourable to the arts of peace, and when political passions were dividing the country, it was no time for poring over books, and holding commune with philosophers and poets. Religious enthusiasm thrives by opposition, and the purity of principle has often been maintained by persecution. It is otherwise with learning and culture. They need encouragement and tending in order to blossom and bear fruit. From a variety of causes, a period of reaction set in after the vigorous and healthy awakening in the time of the Tudors. The fault of the seventeenth century was its lack of earnestness about intellectual matters. It combined all the faults of all the ages—laxity of morals, indifference to high aims, combined with religious fanaticism and a lack of appreciation of knowledge and learning. The Puritan party were so much engrossed with religious dogmas, that they had little time to spend on purely secular thought, which they considered a frivolous if not a sinful exercise. The Royalists loved pleasure too well to give more than passing attention to serious studies. The period of the Restoration is thus described by a writer in the next century—
“Religion which had been in vogue in the late times was now universally discountenanced; the name of it was hardly mentioned but with contempt, in a health or a play. Those who observed the sabbath and scrupled profane swearing and drinking healths were exposed under the opprobrious names of puritans, fanaticks, presbyterians, republicans, seditious persons.”
The advantages to be derived from intellectual liberty were not appreciated. Charles II., joking with the Royal Society, to whom he loved to propound insoluble problems, reflects the attitude of the aristocracy towards science and literature. By that time Shakespeare was considered a little out of date and vulgar by an age of fops and élégantes who could read Wycherley without blushing. There was a quiet cultured set, such as Evelyn and his friends. Evelyn’s daughter Mary, who died at the age of about nineteen, was a most accomplished and studious girl, and shared her father’s literary labours and enjoyments. But the seventeenth century was not favourable to the production of scholars. As the intellectual horizon widened learning became less profound. Women’s education was pursued on somewhat different lines. There was less scholarship among the best-educated women. We do not hear of ladies corresponding in Greek or translating from the Hebrew. The classics no longer held the chief place in the curriculum. Literature was multiplying in English and other living languages, and music and painting were more cultivated.
But there was little attempt, in the seventeenth century, to provide substitutes for what women had lost by the dissolution of the convent schools. For accomplishments, such as singing and dancing, wealthy families engaged special masters—generally French—and the domestic chaplain sometimes acted as tutor for the more solid parts of education. Among middle-class families, however, whose means did not allow of private tuition, the girls came off badly, there being very few schools of any sort, and very scanty supplies of literature in the home.