Windham County Democrat. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1836-1853, 1853-09-28
From the Christian Depository.
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II. 2. c. says in the Repository of Sept. LIST
that chat must be woman's sphere where she can
exert the widest and best influence, where she can
be freed from her wrongs, and unite with that ev-
er advancing series of agencies and means which
elevate our race to higher point of culture and
Christian civilization" Well and good If wo-
man has sphere apart from man, has sphere
as aconadn this is it, But directly, II. p. c. says
that that sphere is home. But what if all women
cannot exert the "widest and best influence" at
home? What ifshe cannot there be "freed from
her wrongs and united with that ever advancing
series of agencies and means which help our race
to a higher point of culture and Christian civiliza-
ton? What if she can exert wider and better
influence in some other station, in that of preach
er, or lecturer, or physician, and has no quafca-
tons that would make her useful as mistress of a
home? Why, she must place herself in the home
sphere or none. She must not, in case she is bet
ter qualified by nature for some other sphere, en-
ter into it. Not even if she can exert wider
and better influence for the elevation of our
What inconsistency! First to attempt to define
a sphere for women as a whole, and then to obge
a part of them to choose and enter another and
different sphere. Where can that woman who
has no fondness for children or housekeeping, but
who is every way adapted for captain of a steam
boat, or ruler of a fortress where can she exert
the widest and best influenced? Has not ii. L.
G. seen mistresses of homes and children, who
neither knew how, or possessed the slightest fac
ulty of doing anything for their instruction and
improvement, who could not teach them the prin-
ciples of moral duty, or regulate them in the
manifestation of wrong tempers or instruct them
in any of the branches of housekeeping but who
were qualified for some station of trust and honor;
that of Post Mistress perhaps, recorder, or tee-
graph operator, or something of the. kind. Are
there not mothers and wives all over the land,
who are utterly miserable, as such, and who cam
not elevate and improve their families, because
they cannot elevate and improve themselves in
that sphere but who could exert the widest and
best influence, and advance the interests of the
whole Christian community, as teachers of moral
science, physiology and astronomy, being by ma
ture qualified for this sphere, and disqualified for
that,
The plain, evident truth in this matter, is this ::
Woman is not adapted to any one prescribed
sphere, acOman. The mere accident of sex,
does not, and in nature cannot, limit or bound her
faculties or gifts for any particular calling She
may have gift for a certain calling, and place
herself, be placed in another if so, she is out
of her sphere. So is man, when he attempts that
for which he is not qualified out of his sphere
We harass ourselves with idle fears, if we mag
inc that woman would neglect her duties, and
leave her sphere for what she is not qualified
for, and has no taste for. Would a happy wife
and mother, who was in the sphere nature de-
signed her for, be likely to neglect her family and
90 abroad on a search after some wild and hazard
Gus uncertainty? Men and women are alike in
this they prefer a certain to an uncertain good !;
they do not leave happiness love and comfort, for
uncongenial strife, discord and uncertainty. A
woman would not of her own accord, leave her
true sphere, the objects of her love and attraction,
any more than the mother bird can leave her shell
tering nest and helpless brood A wife and mo-
Their must be wife and mother, as a rose must
be a rose and lily lily. But this limiting and
bounding the spheres of man and woman kind
has reS%td il G ta %s G 56Oahd R %e Gr5d
little particle of quartz, which had an affinity for
other little particles of quartz, to join with them
in the formation of a crystal? And how ridcu-
lous should we make ourselves, were we to attempt
to compel the little violet or tulip, to blossom on
a nettle or cabbage.
But besides all this, what has been the result of
our attempting to educate woman for a particular
sphere, the home sphere. Our young ladies are
regardless of everything except to secure homes,
and husbands who shall support their idleness,
and indulge their frivolous caprces, and take them
out on exhibition on every public occasion. They
have been educated to secure homes and husbands,
as of course they should be, if that is their sphere
exclusively; consequently they look no higher,
and consequently we see so many who are unfit
for the discharge of home duties So many who
are out of their spheres.
But II. p. G. says, 'Tf women have any wrongs
to redress, they must educate their husbands,
brothers and sons, to redress them. Then let us
redress all wrongs in the same way. Let us not
try to stop the evils of intemperanee, slavery or
anything of the kind, but let us wait until our sons
husbands, and brothers, are educated to remove
them. Better endure them few centuries lon
ger, than to allow woman to help in the work. be-
cause then she would be out of her sphere even
altho she was gifted with a better talent for
kening the spirit and desire of improvement
and Christian culture, than her sons, husbands or
brothers. Why are we trying to do away with
intemperance, by the passage of the Maine law
Let us wait until our sons and brothers have been
educated to remove it.
If the Maine law is passed in New York, it will
be by the efforts of the women as public lecturers
and petitioners but doubtless it would be sooner
and more effectually accomplished, by their stay
ing at home and educating their sons and brothers
to do it. Woman's influence is great, and wide
and high; her powers of eloquence and persua-
sion are unequalled therefore, this influence and
these powers should be confined to the narrowest
possible limit, for fear she should use them in a
bad cause or detract something from the glory
and loneliness of man, whom it is her delight to
serve and honor, as it should be the delight of
each TO truly serve and honor the other. If wo-
man rises to higher position in the social scale,
must not man rise also? And if we degrade one,
do we not injure the other? AUGUSTA.