Waterbury evening Democrat., 1893-11-13
SEX RELATIONSHIP.
A CALM AND oIsPAssloNATE VIEW OF
 1.-THE WOMAN QUESTION"

The Future oF n Nations Prosperity De-
 pends In Great Part on the Marriage Re
 Iation-LessOns Drawn From the History
 of Ancient Greece and Rome.
 The rights and wrongs of women are now debated with vigor and virulence which increase every day. Those who demand for women not only all the priv ileges which men possess, but also con tinued exemption from their responsi- bilities, would carry the principle of fe- male emancipation to point which has aroused opposition on the part of many who in every great question of the day are admittedly leaders of the party of progress. While the contest rages as to whether women are to know, say and do everything that the coarsest of men can, or, on the other hand, be kept completely in the background, people are apt to for get what is really the crucial point of the whole question.
 They forget that the position of wom- en, and of men, too, for that matter, is inseparably bound up with the rela- tionships between the sexes known as marriage; are apt to forget the impor- tance of that relationship not only to in- dividuals, but to the state; are apt to forget that too rigorous a subjection of women may bring us near to barbarism, too great an emancipation may lead to that corruption which has so often in the worlds history been the outcome of civilization which has not placed due restraint on the passions and impulses.
 The prosperity of country depends on the proper maintenance of the rela- tions between husband and wife quite as much as on its outer strength, and however great and powerful country may seem to be, if these domestic rela- tions are unhealthy, if the wife has not her place in the social polity, that coun- try is rotten to the core, and its complete decay and demoraEzation are inevitable. Speaking generally, there are four as poets or ideals of the status of the wife -four ways in which her position is re- garded by men.
 There is the method of the barbarian, that of the oriental, that of western civ ilization, that of corrupt civilization, which last is practically the degraded form of the third. The barbarian re- gards his wife as a mere slave-a squaw lO NSOh AOO$As NalAs HIS OuAAC1SI b0D- init to his ill usage. The oriental sees in his wife plaything to gratify his pas sions, to be kept in the strictest seclu- sion, and to be treated altogether as a brainless being; regarded by him, in fact, so far as any respect is concerned, much as the squaw is regarded by the savage.
 From the third point of view the wife's position is very different. True, she is the mother of her husbands children; true, she has duties to perform which her husband would disdain; true, her husband is the head of the family, and she bears his name. But with all this she is looked upon as her husbands equal, is the sharer of his counsels, his intelligent partner and has a right to ex- pect from him the fidelity which in the ] case of the savage or the oriental is so one sided.
 The credit of placing this view of mar ried life before mankind has been claimed by Christian writers for their religion. But although we must admit that Christianity has done much to inn prove the position of woman, yet the high ideal which we have termed that of western civilization existed in very strong degree in ancient Greece, still more strongly among the Romans and the nations of western Europe, whom they conquered and civilized long before Christianity was preached, and the noble qualities which we admire in those races may often be directly traced to the in fuence of wives and mothers.
 But high as is this ideal, history shows that there are dangers which threaten | those societies where it prevails; dan ger the outcome of that very civilization which it has done so much to perfect Luxury, prosperity, too great liberty, want of mutual respect and continual | striving after new sensations are too apt | to destroy that wholesome state of things which has been the palladium of every great nation, and we too often have ex- amples of the fourth ideal, which, though springing from the third, is so distinct from it that it deserves to be classed by ] itself. Where wife is no longer con tent with taking her share in the battle of life, no longer content to recognize the fact that there are things which it better becomes the woman to do than the man, and vice versa; when she insists on aping and sharing the follies and 1 wees UT II0 IndLs on CdSIlu5 IEOn neE that modesty and reserve which are woman's greatest charms; when she spurns maternity and domestic duties as trivial or monotonous. then indeed the marriage state must fall into disrepute; then the fatherland must surely suffer. It was this which led to the unspeak- able horrors of imperial Rome; it was the unsexed women, their profigacy only | equaled by their audacity, who were re- sponsible as much as Nero and Domi- tian themselves for the downfall of Ro- man civilization. Otho and Silius would have been impossible but for Poppea and Messalina. In latter times, too, and even in Christian countries, where the marriage tie was in theory held so sa- cred that if duly celebrated it could only be dissolved by death, we have seen a state of things as bad.-Westminster | Review
 Alcohol as n Food.
 l And now a word about alcohol. Oi | a1l fhn a,,ko- | .