The Penn's Grove record., 1895-06-21
Rev. DR.. TRLuAGE.
GhS brooklyn Divine's Sunday
Sermon.
Subject: "Woman's Opportunity"

NNtS "NHNN
Genesis H., 20.
God, who can make no mistake, made mar
and woman for a specific work and to move
In particular sp~heres-man to be regnant
in h1srealm; woman to bO dominant in hers.
The boundary line between Italy and Swift
erland, between England and Scotland, is
not more thoroughly marked than this dis
ttnction between the empire masculine and
the empire feminine. So entirely dissimilar
are the ffeldst to which God called them that
you can no more compare them than yli9 can
oxygen and hydrogen, water anG grass
trees and stars. All this talk about the SUI
pertority OF one sex to the other sex is an
everlasting waste Of ink and speech. A jew
eler may have a scale so delicate that he can
weigh the dust of diamonds, but where are
the scales so delicate that you can weigh ia
them atlection against affection, sentiment
against sentiment, thought against thought,
soul against soul, a mans world against d
woman's world? You com out with your
s~tereotyped remark that man is superior to
woman in intellect, and then / open on my
desk the swarthy, iron typed, thunderbolted
writings OF Harriet Martineau and Elizabeth
Browning and George Eliot. You come on
with yourstereotyped remark about woman's
superiority TO man in the item Of affection,
but ! ask you where was there more capa.
city to love than in John, the disciple. and
Matthew Simpson, the bishop, and Henry
Martyr. the missionary
The heart Of those men were so large that
after you had rolled into IL two hemispheres
there was room still left to marshal the hosts
Of heaven and set up the throne OF the eter.
nal Jehovah. l deny to man the throne in.
tellectual; l deny to the throne af-
f~ectonal. No human phraseology will ever
define the spheres. while there is an intuition
by which we know when a man is in his
realm, and when a woman is in her realm,
and when either Of them is out of it. No
bungling legislature ought to attempt to
mRkea definition orto say, ''Ihis is the line
and that is the line" My theory is that if a
woman wants to vote she ought to vote, and
that ifa man wants to embroider n keep
house he ought to be allowed to embroider
md keep house. There are masculine wo-
men N there are efTeminate men. My
theory is that you have no right TO Interfere
with any ones doing anything that Is
righteous. Albany and Washington might as
we'll decree by legislation how high a brown
thra shers should fly or how deep a trout
should plunge as to tryto seek ont the height
and depth Of woman's duty. The question
OF capacity will settle fina ly the whole ques-
ti6iIthe whole subject. When a woman is
pref 1ared to preach, she will preach, and
neither conference nor presbytery can hinder
her.1 When a woman is prepared to move
In lghest commercial spheres, she will have
gre \ influence on the exchange, and no
boz DIS of trade can hinde her. l want wo-
mF to understand that heart and brain can
ov fly any barrier that politicians may set
uPE and that nothing can keep her back or
Ike her down but the question Of incapac.
e-xas In New Zealand last year Just after
tho opportunity of suffrage had been con-
fef ed upon women. The plan worked well.
TN ire had never been such good order at
tn Hpolls, and the righteousness triumphed.
MI have not made such r wonderful moral
| suAcess Of the ballot box that they need fear
woA1en-wiu corrupt it. In all our cities man
has so nearly made the ballot box a failure,
suppose we let women try. But there are
sons women, / know, of most undesirable
| nature, who wander up and down the count
~trA-haying no homes of their own or for4
| sal ing their own homes-talking about their
rights, and we know very well that they
themselves are ft neither to vote nor keep
house. Their mission seems merely to hui
initiate the two sexes at the thought Of what
any one of us might become. No one would
want to live under thelaws that such women
would enact or to w cast upon society the
Chi tiren that such women would raise. But
| / shall show you that the best rights that
woman can own she already has in her pos
session; that her position in this country at
this time is not one OF comniseration, but
| Onei OF CONTEMPLATION ludl lue SIuuucuE
| and power of her realm have never yet been
appreciated; that she sits to-day on a throne
| so high that all the thrones OF earth piled On
| top of each other would not make for her
| a footstool. Here is the platform On WHOM
| she stands. Away down below il ara
| ths ballot box aud the congressional lsseE'
| blase and the legislative hall. Woman
| alE Ays has voted and always will vote. Our
| Observation-Disclosures thought they were by
y Eka4. 1850 nrrtti,tn WoahinufnO intD the Pres.
| idential chair, No. His mother, by the
principles she taught him, and by the habits
| she tnculcated, made him President. 1t was
a Christian mothers hand dropping the bal
| lot when Lord Bacon wrote and Newton
| ph bsophized and Alfred the Great governed
| a~nd3Jonathan Edwards Numbered OF iudg-
| merit to come.
How many men there have been in high
| political station who would have been in
sufficient to stand the test to which their
| moral principle was put had 1t not been for
| a wtfe's voice that encouraged them to do
| rjaht and o wife's prayer that sounded louder
than the clamor OF pRrtisanship2 The right
| OF euffrage as we men exercise 1t seems to be
q eble thing. You, a Christian man, come
up % the ballot box and you drop your vote.
Right after you comes a libertine or a sot-
the onscouring OF the s~treet-and he drops
his vote, and his vote counteraets yours.
| But II IN the quiet OF home life q daughter by
| her Christian demeanor, a wife by her In
dustry, a mother by her f~sithfulness, casts a
vote "a the right direction, then nothing can
| resist 1t, and the influence of that vote will
| throb through the eternities.
Ely chief anxiety then is not that woman
haae other rights accorded her, but that she,
BIZ the grace OF God, rise up to the apprecia-
tioa OF the glorious rights she already pos
| sesses First, she has the right to make
| hone happy, That realm 40 one has over
| dis5uted with her. Ben may come home al
| noon or at night, and then tarry a compare
| tivejy little while, but she. all day long, gov
| errAlit, beauties it, sanctihes it. 1t is with
in Der power to make 1t the most attractive
| plaGe on earth. 1t is the only calm harboT
N his world. You know as well as 1 do that
| tbl4 outside world and the business world
| arsR long scene OF jostle and contention.
III man who has a dollar struggles to keep
| 1t; the man who has it not struggles to get 1t.
Pieces up, Prices down. Losses. Gains.
MIsrepresentations. Underselling. Buyers
depreeiating; statesmen e&aggeratlng. Ten
arts seeking less rem; landlords demanding
more. struggles about office. Men who are
jnitrying TO keep in; men out trying to gel
In. Slips. Tumbles. DefalcatiOns. Pam
icAl C4tastrophes. o woman, thank God
Vdh have q home, and that you may be
queen In 1t. Better be there than wear VIC
toria's coronet. B1tter be- there than carry
the purse Of a princess.
Your abode may he humble, but you can.
BY youf faith In Col and your cheeriulness
Oh deneanor. gild il with %splendors such as
an upbolsterer's hand never yet kindled.
There nre abodes in every eity-humble, two
stories, four plain, unpapered rooms, unde
slrable neighborhood, and yet there is a mar
who would q e on the threshold rather thar
surrender. Why2 1t is home. Whenever
he thinks OIL he secs angels OF God hover
ing around 1t. The ladders ofheaven are le
down to that house. Over the child's rough
crib there are the ehantingso of angels as those
that broke over Bethlehem. II Is home
These children may come up after awhile
and they MAJ win high position, and the,
may have an afluent residence, but they vii
not until their dying day forget that humble
roof. under which their father rested anl
their mother sang and their sisters played
oh, II you would gather up all tender mem
cries. all the tights and shades of the heart
all banuuetings and reunions. all hlial. frater
raj. paterral and conjugal affections. andyos
Ind only last four letters with which 70 spei
eut that height and depth and length AMI
breadth a dmagnitude and eternity o mean
Ing. YOU would, with streaming eyes AM
trembling voice and agitated hand, write
out b. hose four living capitals, HOMIE
Whai right DOES woman want that y
snnder than 10 be queen u such a realm
J Why, the eagles Of heaven cannot ny acros