How bravely women do it too. Aching hearts and throbbing brows are forgotten in the fight for daily existence. Poor souls, how hard many of them toil, how lonely are their lives, and what a struggle it is for them to keep their heads above water. Many of them do so, however; and to them all honour is due.
Men and women should never be pitted as rivals in anything. Each sex has its own place to fill; but when the exigencies of fighting for existence occur, men should nobly help the courageous woman worker over the difficulties her men-folk have thoughtlessly placed before her.
I hate sex. Surely, in working, thinking, human beings—it does not matter whether one wears petticoats or trousers—there should be no sex as regards bread-earning. There are a million and a quarter too many women in England, and the gates of independence and occupation must not be shut in their faces. Personally, I should like boys and girls to be equal in everything. Forget sex, bring them up together, educate them together. Send them to public schools and Universities together, open all the trades and professions to women the same as to men. Let them stand shoulder to shoulder.
Many people thought that the heavens would descend if a woman became a doctor. They were wrong. Women are doing well in medicine and surgery, though they are still excluded from the Bar and the Church.
Yes, give girls just the same advantages as boys. Divide your incomes equally amongst all your children when you die, irrespective of sex. Give them equality in divorce. The world will be all the happier.
Women will find their own level—just as men do; they will make or mar their own lives—just as men do. But let men cease shutting gates of employment in their faces.
A nation’s power depends on the physical strength and character of its women, and not on its army of men, or its statesmen.
How I envy men with professions. They come down to comfortable breakfasts, without the least idea of what will be laid before them. They enjoy it, have a look at the papers, perhaps a pipe, and then they get into boots and top-coat, go off to their chambers, offices, studios, or their consulting-rooms, as the case may be. They throw themselves into their work, knowing that no interruptions will occur during the whole course of the morning.
They enjoy their luncheon, which they have not had the worry of ordering beforehand, and so by the time four, or five, or six o’clock arrives they have done a good day’s work without annoyance from outside. They have earned so much money, and not far off they see a tangible reward. Lucky men!