The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1889-02-13
THE CLUBS FOR WOMEN.
MARION HARLANo GIVES HER OPINION
when Clubs For Women Are Beneficial
What They should BE and Consist
Of-HOw To Be Conducted
They Benefit Women.
Copyrighted, 1sssl

Copyrighted, lSssl
The specific effect OF two-thiris OF the
education acquired from school-b'ooks and
tuition is to form the texture OF the mind.
That sentence is sufficiently important
20 stand as a paragraph. The professional
scholar whose erudition is the pride OF his
generation will tell you that in college he
learned nothing of positive value except
how to study. The soil was broken up,
cleared of noxious growth and barren
Jumps, and made arabic. What may be
technically classified as "paying crops"
were put in by himself at later date.
Were not this rule almost universal IN
application higher education" would,
for vast majority of women, be time, la
Dor and money thrown away. The girl
graduate who does not propose to become
teacher, author or editor, or to be anything
but the petted resident OF ner father
house for the remainder Of her ceiibate
life. finds herself with enough crude in
lellectual material on hand TO plunge an
economic manufacturer into despair. II
she has no specially, such as music, or
drawing, or botany TO engage her en-
orgies, and is yet of a strain too
noble TO be content with the
empty round of frivolous amusements
that make the society girls heaven,
she is a pitiabIe specimen OF unremuner-
alive investments. The emptiness OF her
life; the vague vearning for she knows
not what-the Standardization which
is measurablv the result OF the abrupt re-
mission Of school tasks and rou-
tine, is mistaken by her for
longing for kinship OF soul and
responsive affection. More women
in her class fall in love, like Molly
Barn sutton, because they have nothing
else to do" and marry for no better rea-
son-tban we are willing, Tor the honor OF
the sex, 10 admit. To dispasslonate
spectator, it would seem that all the ma
rhineTv OF domestic and social lie IS ar
ranged with the express design Of forcing
women into matrimOny.
When once these agencies have accom-
plished their end, they leave Our GIrl to
work out her own satisfaction (Or the re-
verse; as best she may.
Before going further. / would guard one
point jealously. Rightly filed, there is
enough in the sphere of wife, hOusekeeper
whatever may be her aspirations. OF
all forms of whining sentimentality,
l have least patience with the cry OF q
higher mission than that OF hOme-making
and collaborating. As the sum OF over
thirty years observation OF this form OF
intellectual unrest, and the peTusal OF
hundreds of letters from the malcontents,
/ assert. without the fear OF cOntradic-
ton. that the unfOrtunates who raise the
lament are, in the proportion OF thou
sand to one, those who are the least lit TO
take the lowest seat IN the WOman's
Kingdom.
Somebody once said funny thing to
me, apropOs of this same queendom OF
woman.
"You would make OF us patent slerators
from the cradle TO the gravel 1t makes
me feel like derrick, from which pulley
and ropes are never taken down.
The SMILES are apt, but the elevator
must have power, and the toughest ropes
chafe into weakness, then part. To the
mother who keeps her mind awake and
busy; who mas the spiritual perception to
see that labor is never ignOble when done
for worthy ends; who has the will force TO
bring her work up TO herself instead of
stoop No to the drudge's level-her mis-
kicn Is divine. CuGD NOlnClA 10 now anu
then, live to be grandmothers, without
other intellectual supplies than those fur
nished from within; spend long, useful
lives that are all outgo and little income.
Usually they die early, and stepmOther5
enter into their labors.
Mind needs foods. intellectual muscle,
unused to exercise, becomes flaccid. The
genuine book-lover will read if she must
steal time from sleep to do it, and what
she gains from the printed page can be as
we'll digested over needle, and ironing
board, and kneading-tray as anywhere
else. Still. books are but silent comforters
at the best, and thought dulls for want of
friction against our minds. Language gets
rusty in the joints, as it were, through
lack OF practice in ''the best lines"
She who establishes q WOman's Read
ing club in an agricultural district does
more TO check the deadly progress of
farmers wives TO the insane asylum than
all the doctors and medical journals in the
land The book selected for social read
ing and discussion may be nothing more
dignifed than 4 popular novel of
healthy tOne-such, for example, as John
Halifax" or a Noble Life" or any other
work from the pen that, IN Dinah Mulock-
Craik's hand, was strength out of which
came sweetness ana Ddl0 lot UeF aye ana
sex, or our own Whitney's The Gay
worthys" or "Hitherto." It will lift
the toiling creatures thoughts out
of the straight deep rut worn
ty plodding feet, gloriiy ''the
level stretches, white with DUST" OF the
common DAYS which heaven help
them ARE every day with this class. The
changed current Of thought and interest
will blow over the cook stove, and dish
pan, and washtub like cool airs from
nights she has no time to climb. 1t gives
her something to talk of, too-boon of
bOons in a circle where gossip is the pabu-
lum OF tea-party conversation and rare
Evenings out" where the mems talk is
of oxen" and the women's OF butter-mak-
ingin holy Sabbath tWilights, with the har-
vest moon looking down upon them over
the tree-tops.
Rising in the scale Of these beneicent
institutions Is the Literary club" where
thoughts evoked by what is read take the
form OF intelligent utterance, and the play
of cultivated minds, the one upon the
other, is like the ring OF silver
wings rather than the clash of steel.
The prejudice against such gallant pion-
GERS as 'SOrosis" and 'The New England
club" muttered itself into admiring silence
such little while ago that we still strain
our ears apprehensivoly for the recurrent
echo. All over our country educated.
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