Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1893-05-18
IN WOMAN'S BEHALF.
THE WoMAN'S PART.
Man Has Done Himself a Wrong in so
Long Restraining Her.

Man Has Done Himself Wrong in
Long Restraining Her.
Women have suffered as only women
can from the long injustice Of mans
misused dominion; but if we look deep
into the soul life OF the world we shall
see that man has done himself a great
er injury than he has been able to in
flict on woman. In holding her subject
to him he has put letters on the being
through whom God has ever sought to
save him from himself Limiting the
exercise of her power and cramping and
distorting her nature he has robbed
himself Of the strongest means of his
own uplifting. He has often, by his
own act, forced her to become his curse
who was meant to be his greatest bless
ing. Perhaps it may seem that in as
signing so large a share of the worlds
redemption to woman, all responsibility
is taken from man and he is left but
passive agent, not capable of nor an
swerable for his own salvation. Far
from this, every individual soul, of man
or woman, must desire and work out
its own salvation. Women may and
often do inspire men with this desire
when nothing else can. Woman's love
will help a man TO make the desire
grow into a beautiful and grand
,iconsummation. But he himself must
battle with and conquer the foe within
his own gates Mans struggle for the
good, woman can but partially under
stand and dimly realize, for she only
sees the world and its evils from the
seclusion of a sheltered home, where
sin may never be told in its fullness;
but she intuitively knows that his en-
counter with the life beyond those
walls is hard, at times desperate, and
her whole being goes out to him with
an aching tenderness, a ceaseless long
ing, a love that would cover him as
with an armor and shield him from all
harm. Men grow stronger because
they are loved so. Right becomes more
precious and more beautiful to every
man when a woman's eyes glow with
rapture at his triumphs and woman's
lips seek his in thankful, speeehless
Joy; and thus women enter into mems
souls and SOW the seed of every higher
aspiration, nobler effort, grander
achievement And the world, slowly it
may SEEM but always surely, uprises
from the errors of the past into the re-
alizaaion of a new and better life. 1t
has become almost a cant phrase to call
this the woman's age. 1t is wOman's
age in a much higher sense than many
perceive; an age when her spiritual
power is to make definite impression;
when it is to take a conscious part in
the active life of the world.
Believing this. we would have all
women question their own souls, listen
to the answer that win come, and docs
it confirm the statements here made,
arise and begin their holy task to-day,
if they have not already done SO. O,
women who are wasting youth and
power and life in the tiuttering round
of butterfly dance, cease your mean
ingless prattle, put aside the trivialities
the conformity the artifciality in which
you have been reared, and set youl
womanhood free to expand, free tC
bless and to purify. You strong women
of brain and of energy, take only love
for your motto, let the rights" you
have bravely striven for and gained be
valued most because of the higher right
they confer of exercising your God~as'
signed mission of redemption. We are
living in days when no human being,
no woman especially, should dare shirk
her portion Of the sacred work Of re
,demption, but with all haste should sci
about it at once: and this in no vague
uncertain way, but with definite inten
ton and steady, consecrated parpose
Whatever experience of struggle, Of
1 horror even, through which the worlC
may have to pass, let women recognize
4 their power and accept their response
bility, and then stand true to that one
word, Love; and the blows of contend
| ing egotism, the corruption of individ
uals and communities, the strife of re
! bellion, the fierceness of war, will be
checked, will be subdued, will bc
healed, in the end will be overcome anc
made impossible for evermore, C )ra
| Maynard, in Arena.