Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1869-06-23

it would be most comfortable for him, doubt
less, to have a quiet, affectionate, peaceable,
amiable wife to bind up his wounds and caress
him Ind lovingly minister to him until he
got sober, but would this prove that it was
right for a man to get drunk, and wrong for a
woman to taste intoxicating drinks? We
suspect DR.. Bushnell would feel obliged to
discuss the relative rights and wrongs of the
use of intoxicating drinks by the use of bet
ter reasoning than this. That suffrage makes
men need the bright corner at home, and the
charming and soothing ministration of a
90 true woman - who do mt know and do Mt
care how the world is governed, and whose
life has for its utmost horizon tho effort to
minister to her husband, is Just as much a
reason why men should not vote, as why
women should not vote. If the strifes of
politics are debasing, they had better be let
alone by both sexes.
But DR.. Bushnell, like some other Doctors,
sees Just where woman's true glory lies. He
says
"Why, if our women could but see what
they are doing now, what superior grades of
beauty and power they fill, and how far above
equality with men they rise, when they keep
their own pure atmosphere of silence, and
their field of peace, how they make a realm
into which the poor bruised fighters, with
their passions CALLED, and their minds SCARED
with wrong-their hates, dis-appointments,
grudgcs and hard-worn ambitions-may come
in, to be quoted and civilized, and get some
touch Of the ang1ic.J think they would be
very little apt to disrespect their womanly
subordinatiOn. 1t will signify anything but
their inferiority. If they are already taken
with the foolish ambition of place. or of win
ming a public name, they may not be satisfied.
But in that case they barter for this honor a
great deal more than they can rightly spare.
Gods highest hOnOrs never go with noise,
but they wait on silent worth, on the con-
sciousness of good. on. secret charities, and
ministries untainted by ambition. Could
they but say TO the noisy nothings Of this
bribery, get thee hence, Satan as Christ
did to the same coarse nonsense or flattery,
they would keep their subjcct-way of life as
he kept his, and would think it honor enough
that they also came not to be ministered INTO,
but to minister. And if it be the question
for them, whether it is better to be classed in
privilege with Jesus the subject, or with
Caesar the sovereign, it should not be difficult
to decide.
What right, pray, has DR.. Bushnell to
have a 3" foolish ambition for place" that
his wife has not? What right has he to
agitate his passions, scar his mind with
wrong, to nurse hates, disappointments,
grudges, and thus put himself in need Of
the ciyilizing, angelic touch of a subordinate
woman? Who gave him liberty to be thus
un-Christlike, and to insist that woman shall
be the medicine for his stormy nature? Has
he not the same divine right and privilege
" to be classed with Jesus, the subject, a." as
woman has, and does he not do violence to
his w high p~rerogative, as much as woman
would, when he insists on being classed
- with Caesar the sovereign" Is not the
command laid on man and woman alike to
be like the Master ?
But the Reverend Doctor is inclined, after
all, to liberate woman from some restraints,
and to allow her to work in some fields beside
the - bright corner at home. He writes on
the subject of - Women in the Church as
follows
Precisely what is allowable, or not allow
able, to women, as regards the clerical pro-
ANE1AgAAr ~ may ADk bC td-g ~ htLC AlAlC
only it is clear as need be that a much larger
and more forward operation is permissible
without damage TO the Christian order, and
with real advantage TO the Christian cause.
We have many more Christian women thar
Christian men their piety ranges higher
and they have --~"y Of them higher 5ifss o.
experience, and practically speaking. a more
instructed insight OF the Christian truth anc
life. They do more volunteer work. s.
r richly gifted, have we still no use to make o.
them, better than to put an extinguisher or
them and keep them in suppression If We
think we are detained by Scripture usage anC
law, We can at least fulfill the Scripture
usage, and make dcacOnesses of them. AnC
if we can make three or four Of them deacon.
esses, we can, with as little disorder, make &
much greater number if we please, and send
5 them forth on missions of public service al
Phebc, the deacOness of the church at Cen.
I chrea, was sent in that manner to Rome
And If they used their Office well, would they
j not d" purchase for themselves a good de.
t gree and great holiness in the faith, even
= as the deacons might in theirs? A single
t glance In this direction shows that a large
field IS here open to the ministration oil
Christian women, a much larger field than
as yet, they have been called to occupy.
As regards the ministry of the word, OF
$ the matter Of public speaking in the church
it is very evident that what Paul lays down
as restriction in the 18th and 14th chapter:
c Of his First Epistle to the Corinthians-re
curing in the former that no woman pray OF
prophecy with her head uncovered, and in
the latter that she keep silence altogether
that all such restriction is now gone by, in
: the going by of the particular specified rea.
SONS in which it was based, viz. the public
4" shame" or scandal 1t would be to religion
under the then accepted laws Of womanly
mOdesty, and the current impressions of dis
n grace incurred and decency violated, wher
:, these laws are ~disregarded. Shame" anc
again shame is the consideration on
; which he turns his argument for restriction
c first in one case and then in another. Blu
We Of the present age have no longer any
feeling that a woman throws off her modestJ
T because she speaks unveiled though, il
: Turkey and some other parts Of the world
that feeling may still prevail. We have still
our likes and dIslikcs, in one degree or an
e other, to the public speaking of women il
S all sorts of assemblies but almost nobod,
. imagincs that a woman who simply prays il
il, the spirit, or takes what Jeremy Taylor call
= 90 the liberty of prophesying," in public
3 meetings for religion, Is therefore broker
G loose from the proper restraints of delicacy.
: 1t is our general conviction that scenes o
battle and high wrestling are not for women
y and that when they 90 in to wrangle thu
, with men, they had much better be some
: where else but nobody has ever observes
l that Lucretia Mott, OF any speaker of tn
Z Quaker sisterhood long practiced in tn
prophesying of the Spirit has been harden
t ing in voice or look, or becoming in any re
spect less womanly. So far the restriction
e of the g shame " are gone by, and the RICH
4 of speaking for religion, under the inspira
J lions of religion, belongs apparently t.
women as to men. And if women have gift
that qualify them specially for such minis
t t~rations, there appears to be no good reason
: longer why they should be kept under tn
ban of silence.