Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1857-10-10
MISS sEDGwICK's PLEA FOa OLD MAIDS

Preface to "Married or SINGLE just published by the IIarpers,1
The want of an innocent occu patton may be rea.
son enough why one should write, but some better
reason or a plausible apology should be rendered
for infiicting the writing upon the public for if
the public, in the large sense, is not obliged to
read, there is q small public of kind friends who
feel a moral obligation to perform that duty, And
q hard duty it may be, when the novel readers
market is supplied by such producers as Dickens,
Thackeray, Charles Reside and Mrs. Gaskell-all
honor, praise and love DO to her-and our own
popular writer's in this department. If we do not
specify Mrs. Stowe, it is that she writes for all
humanity. Her books cam IT be restricted to any
class of readers, nor claimed exclusively by any
department of literature.
The writer of married or Single" has the fears
and faltering of a stranger in appearing before
the present public. The generation known to her,
and which extended a welcome and a degree OF
favor to her, has, for the most part, passed away.
Most of those friends are gone whose hearts vibra-
ted without the vanlt es or seitishness or person
ality) to her success, and she is left to feel the
chill and dreariness of the "banq uet.hall deserted. y
Still, she has friends who speak the God,speed,
and young friends who will receive the fruits OF
her observation Of the defects and wants Of our
social life with righteousness, and, perhaps, with
some profit and, possibly, there are those who
will relish better q glass of water from our own
fountains than a draught Of French connection
whose enticing flavor but d~isguises its insidious
poison.
1t might seem natural and decorous that one
approaching the limit of human life, should-it
writing at all-write u book strictly religious bu,
the novel land to that guild we belong) does moi
seem to us the legitimate vehicle Of strictly relig
ious teaching. Secular affairs should be permeat
ed by the spirit of the altar and the tenn pie, bu|
not brought within tho temples holy precincts.
One word more-the moral Of our s%tory-to oui
young feminine readers. We have given I've con
fess with some disposition to re5e) the most prac.
teal proof of our allegiance to the ancient law
of romance, by making our hero and heroine mar
and wife duly and truly. ORaia rite solemne actC
stunt, We shall not therefore, be suspected Of ir
reverence to the great law Of nature by which, il
every province of her infinitely various kingdom
''all kindred drops are melted into one"
But we raise our voice with all our might
against the miserable cant thst matrimony is es
sential to the feebler sex-that a woman's single
life must be useless or undigniied-that she is but
an adjunct of man-in her best state a helm 10
guide the nobler vessel. Aside from the great
task of humanity, for which masculine capacities
are best fitted, we believe she has an independent
power to shape her own course and to force her
separate sovereign way. Happily no illustration
is needed at this day 10 prove that msidens can
perform. with grace and honor, duties from which
wives and mothers are exempted by their Gomes-
tic necessities. Our Sisters of Mercy and Charity
however they may be called, are Limited to no
faith and to no peculiar class of illustrations.
Their smiles brighten the whole world.
But we speak especially to those of our maidens
whose modesty confines their efficiency to the cir
Gle which radiates from their line. We pray such
to emember that their sexes share of the sterner
sacrifices, as well as the softer graces of Chris
tan love, does not belong alone to the noble
Florence Nigh ingales of our day. any more than
the real glories of feminine beroism were once
all bound to the helmet Of Joan Of Arc. 1t ia
not in the broad and noisy fields sought by the
apostles of "Women's Rights" that sisterly love
and ~maidenly charity bes. diffuse their native
sweetness. These are sensitive owers-to
bright and sweet, indeed, as our language hat
Just partly implied, to be fully typifed by thai
pale plant of which it is said, that
"Radiance and odor are not its DOVER"
but resembling it in the essential character from